Dean and Deluca Is Closing Its Stores | Hacker News Reader

Dean and Deluca Is Closing Its Stores

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42 pointsprostoalex26 comments

Dean & Deluca was among the first online stores built with Viaweb in 1996 (the founders of Viaweb went on to start Y Combinator). I remember some difficulty trying to get their copperplate font to render nicely into GIFs without dithering. (There were no webfonts at the time -- if you wanted a branded look, you had to render an image on the server.)

> And for months, small businesses have turned to social media to complain about the company’s outstanding debts.

Though D&D was a company and the situation is somewhat different, this reminds me of my tutoring experience with a few supposedly affluent NYC clients; they had a similar capacity to appear posh while somehow being unable to pay their invoices without heavy cajoling. Made me happy I forced clients to sign up for recurring payment with stripe, which at least reduced the number of times I had to "remind" them. My own experience is obviously anecdotal and specific, but if anything I found a negative correlation between external markers of wealth and ability/willingness (same result on my end) to pay invoices.

When John Kerry was running for president, I heard that his wife, the heir to the Heinz fortune, shopped for groceries there. So I went. My goodness... $11 cubes of chocolate, $90 bottles of maple syrup, it just seemed... way overboard. I'm surprised it lasted this long.

So even worse than Williams Sonoma or Sur La Table?

Neither of those are grocery stores

Yup, probably delicatessen stores which is entirely different purpose and segment.

Though they do sell some packaged food at Williams Sonoma. Last time I was in there I picked up some items as Christmas presents, and it wasn't until I got home that I realized that I had purchased a box of marshmallows for $20.

"...it just seemed... way overboard. I'm surprised it lasted this long.

In NYC and quite a few other cities it can last forever. They are a lot of super rich people and $100 for them is like a penny to us. Expanding is a different story...

Whole Foods and Harris Teeter are just 2 of many stores that have taken over the gourmet markets... Pretty sure their expansions are what killed D&D.

At one point, it was both luxurious and practical.

I remember when it was the only store in town to have jamon iberico. Its macaroons were huge mounds of coconut. Its Brie on baguette was a guilty pleasure ... at $10!

Eataly is the internet to D&D’s newspaper. The editors have edited poorly for the last few years; at the end it felt like it was an overpriced seller of gift baskets — Harry & David at twice the price.

I don't know about groceries, but the SoHo store was a pretty decent place for lunch opposite 568 Broadway (where 10gen, Foursquare, Zocdoc and many other NYC startups have been located).

I'll go against the grain here and say that I absolutely loved Dean and Delucas when I found one when I was living in Tokyo last year. Yeah the packaged goods were super obnoxiously priced but the hot prepared food was very very good and was priced in line with anything else in that general area(maybe $10 for a lunch).

Some of the best pastries I've ever had from a chain bakery. F

I'm not sure about this, but it seems that the Japanese Dean and DeLuca is just a Japanese company owning and operating the brand under license or joint venture. This is how a lot of foreign brands enter Japan (for example, Taco Bell and Baskin Robbins), and why many remain even when the original company more or less goes under (for example, Mister Donut). I wouldn't be surprised if this ends up being the same.

Nothing special, just overpriced. Eataly is basically what they tried to, and should have, become.

> Nothing special, just overpriced

Agree. Fairway and Citarella have more fresh variety. D&D was processed, packaged and pretty.

I find Eataly also overpriced and nothing special, just less dated (for now).

I’ve had more delicious food in European airports.

It’s pricey, but it feels like a Disneyland for foodies, which is what D&D should have tried to do and why AFAIK they keep expanding worldwide (just saw a new one on the Strip in Las Vegas, no less). Also the restaurants and rooftop in the one in NYC are all great as far as atmosphere goes. Food is reasonable IMO.

The foods here used to be special but in the last 10 years seemed more focused on tourists.

This company somehow managed to not make money in a store located in Napa Valley. Think about that for a minute.

Awww, the ones in Bangkok made a nice little place to get American food and a glass of wine

There is/was one in Khao Yai. I stopped there once. It was a freaking food truck selling 400 baht hamburgers.

They had stores??

Yes, Hannibal Lecter shopped there after he chopped his hand off.

Interesting you said this because I always thought this was actually an Asian brand having mostly only seen them in Japan and Korea.

There's a trend of Asia reviving some old western brands, like 7-Eleven, Denny's, Yahoo, Mister Donut.

7-Eleven has been a Japanese company for close to 30 years, and started opening stores in Japan long before that. If there's a trend, it long predates it, but my sense is that 7-Eleven never sold itself as American kitsch but was simply a business model that worked well elsewhere. It seems similar to KFC in that regard--far more KFCs overseas than in the U.S. as fried chicken has near universal appeal--though KFC and Colonel Sanders in particular is much more of an American cultural export.

Chains like A&W began opening stores in Asia in the 1960s. And not just around American military bases--a franchise was started in Malaysia in 1963. In general I think the trend isn't one of revival but more that these brands were already global when their American market disappeared. But maybe chains like Denny's and Mister Donut are different stories.

>$75 bespoke ice cubes

Yep, this place needs to die before it summons Slaanesh.

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