This article was originally published in Boro Magazine in July 2019.
In Long Island City, the Entrepreneur Space is helping local food businesses get to the next level.
The incubator, which offers kitchen space for rent, also offers resources, counseling and partnership building for clients who come to get started. The space is part of an NYCEDC initiative in partnership with the Queens Business Council.
“We want to get them to the next level,” said Patricia Richter, client services manager. “We don’t expect you here for more than three to five years.”
Former clients have gone on to sell nationally, open a warehouse and copack (package food) for other food businesses that are expanding.
Meet four businesses Richter introduced to Boro. Some are sharing parts of their heritage or their passion, and say the diverse Queens community nourishes their businesses, while the Entrepreneur Space helps it grow.
Hungry Bars
Astoria resident Vlad Harkovski makes gluten free granola and granola bars that sell in stores across the city. The company’s intent is to deliver a high-quality product and share their love for granola. Products include packages of granola featuring fruit, nuts, spices and other mix-ins like “G’morning sunshine mix,” “Awesome apricot” and “Chocolate noir.” For more on-the-go snacking, the company also sells the same mixes as single-serving bars.
Harkovski, who started the company in 2012 with his wife, said he joined the Entrepreneur Space a couple of years later. He said the location not only provides manufacturing space, but also marketing, networking and sales leads and support. Currently he sells the bars at the following stores in Astoria. Next steps are to scale up and find a co-pack to take care of manufacturing the original recipe.
Look out for the bars at Foodcellar Market in Long Island City, and in Astoria, Green Bay Organic, Vitality and Health and Natural Frontier Market.
Lion City Coffee
The brother duo behind Lion City Coffee, which serves authentic Singaporean hawker food, were inspired by their late father’s passion for cooking and constant search for good Singaporean food.
After moving from Singapore to New York City in the late 1980s, Lion City they'd try to replicate the food after returning from visits home.
“We would always hit up the kopijiams and hawker centers upon return then try to replicate our favorites in New York City.”
The brothers, who live in Forest Hills and Long Island City, serve the food at local markets, like Taste of Sunnyside in May. They will be at the Queens night Market at the New York Hall of Science most Saturdays this year.
They are known for “mee pork” — egg noodles with fishballl and minced meat; “chai tow kueh” — stir-fried radish cake; “kata toast” — toast with coconut jam and “kopi — Coffee served sweetened with condensed milk, unsweetened with milk, or black” They also sell the jars of their signature James packaged topi and other baked goods on their online store.
Find where they will be next @lioncitycoffee.
Spice Tree Organics
Dooa Elkady has a Middle Eastern background and has always created healthy, flavorful, homemade meals for her family. When she realized that traditional store-bought spices have radiation, pesticides and toxins, she sought out organic spices to maintain the nutritious, healthy dishes.
When she searched for organic spices, she either couldn’t find them or they tasted “horrible.” In spring 2016, Elkady and her sister-in-law, Nokaly Sreva, both moms of young children, started their own business mixing spices. To join E Space, they had to review their business plan.
“They’re big on making sure the business is profitable,” she said of the incubator. “They helped us with pricing and packaging.” She said the Space was flexible, they don’t need kitchen space since they are mixing and bottling. They also had to invest in more storage space as the business has grown. The space also helped them navigate FDA regulations and paired them with a business counselor, marketing consultant and a marketing class.
“Every year we find ourselves booking more time,” she said.
Elkady said given that they are cooks, they know how to put together tasty spice blends that immediately elevate a recipe, and save people from using 13 different spices. Some of the offerings include “list spices”
The two founders sell the spices at farmers' markets where they do most of their sales. There, they create relationships with their customers and make a lasting impression.
“It’s not often you see Muslim women on the forefront, so it’s memorable," Elkady said.
They plan to do a rebrand of the site to sell more online, and packaging this summer and start selling the top sellers in bigger jars for retail.
“We’re really fortunate to be living in Queens, people know ethnic cuisine, so our spices resonate with them.”
Destination Dumplings
Chef Tristan Chin-Fatt and Deon Whiskey, friends who grew up together in Queens, started a modern handmade dumpling business out of the Entrepreneur Space. Both have spent years working in restaurants and combined their dual experience in kitchens with their heritage and love of New York City to start the dumpling business.
Chin-Fatt said the dumplings are their platform to showcase the city’s cultural diversity, and their own. He is Chinese-Jamaican, so customers will find both a classic pork and chive dumpling and a Jamaican jerk chicken version on the menu.
They said joining the E space helped keep costs down and grow during the first years of business, and to make their dumplings.
He said they don’t use any machines — they make the fillings by hand— a hundred pounds a week — and produce 15,000 dumplings a week.
“All the dumplings are made by hand and with love and care,” Chin-Fatt said.
Richter is helping the duo find space in Long Island City and has helped them get the dumplings to sell in Citifield. The duo looks forward to finding a permanent home so “our customers can find us throughout the entire year”.