Red Eye Cookie Co. now has its own storefront on Grace Street next to a newly opened hookah bar and shawarma restaurant. Photo by Michael Thompson.
Where one late-night cookie delivery service exited, another has risen.
Locally based Red Eye Cookie Co. opened for business Sept. 17 at 935 W. Grace St. in the heart of VCU. The storefront was formerly home to the Richmond outpost of Red Eye’s out-of-town rival Campus Cookies.
Brayden Pleasants, who launched Red Eye last year, said the company is leasing the storefront, which gives it a retail presence and doubles its production capacity from its previous space farther east on Grace Street.
Pleasants said Campus Cookies owner Scott Davidson contacted him about taking over the space. Davidson closed the store over the summer after operating there for less than a year.
“We had developed a relationship prior to that,” Pleasants said. “(Davidson) was kind enough to reach out to us to include us in the process.”
Campus Cookies still has locations in Blacksburg, Charlottesville and Harrisonburg and Greenville, North Carolina.
Pleasants said he has long been in search of a permanent home for Red Eye. The company shared its former location at 708 E. Grace St. with Sally Bell’s Kitchen. That property was purchased last year by VCU. Sally Bell’s is relocating to 2337 W. Broad St., according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
Pleasants said he’s glad he was able to stay near VCU.
“I was really looking at a location to stay in the Grace Street corridor,” he said.
Red Eye Cookie and its 22 employees make and deliver cookies on late-night hours. It also sells coffee and milk, as well as ice cream and cookie cakes. It charges $1.50 for a regular cookie and $2.30 for a premium cookie. It delivers around the city and VCU, as well as to the West End and University of Richmond if orders are large enough. Its cookies are also sold in about 15 retail stores.
The company still has at least one rival in town. Insomnia Cookie, one of the biggest late-night cookie delivery companies in the country, has a location at 918 W. Grace St. It’s within a cookie’s throw across the street from Red Eye’s new home.
Pleasants said he thinks Red Eye has a good enough following, not to mention product, to compete.
“The late-night cookie delivery industry is an emerging market,” he said. “There’s word on the street (about Red Eye), and we’re very happy with it.”
Red Eye Cookie Co. now has its own storefront on Grace Street next to a newly opened hookah bar and shawarma restaurant. Photo by Michael Thompson.
Where one late-night cookie delivery service exited, another has risen.
Locally based Red Eye Cookie Co. opened for business Sept. 17 at 935 W. Grace St. in the heart of VCU. The storefront was formerly home to the Richmond outpost of Red Eye’s out-of-town rival Campus Cookies.
Brayden Pleasants, who launched Red Eye last year, said the company is leasing the storefront, which gives it a retail presence and doubles its production capacity from its previous space farther east on Grace Street.
Pleasants said Campus Cookies owner Scott Davidson contacted him about taking over the space. Davidson closed the store over the summer after operating there for less than a year.
“We had developed a relationship prior to that,” Pleasants said. “(Davidson) was kind enough to reach out to us to include us in the process.”
Campus Cookies still has locations in Blacksburg, Charlottesville and Harrisonburg and Greenville, North Carolina.
Pleasants said he has long been in search of a permanent home for Red Eye. The company shared its former location at 708 E. Grace St. with Sally Bell’s Kitchen. That property was purchased last year by VCU. Sally Bell’s is relocating to 2337 W. Broad St., according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
Pleasants said he’s glad he was able to stay near VCU.
“I was really looking at a location to stay in the Grace Street corridor,” he said.
Red Eye Cookie and its 22 employees make and deliver cookies on late-night hours. It also sells coffee and milk, as well as ice cream and cookie cakes. It charges $1.50 for a regular cookie and $2.30 for a premium cookie. It delivers around the city and VCU, as well as to the West End and University of Richmond if orders are large enough. Its cookies are also sold in about 15 retail stores.
The company still has at least one rival in town. Insomnia Cookie, one of the biggest late-night cookie delivery companies in the country, has a location at 918 W. Grace St. It’s within a cookie’s throw across the street from Red Eye’s new home.
Pleasants said he thinks Red Eye has a good enough following, not to mention product, to compete.
“The late-night cookie delivery industry is an emerging market,” he said. “There’s word on the street (about Red Eye), and we’re very happy with it.”