Russ & Daughters coming to Brooklyn Navy Yard

February 2, 2016 Anna Spivak

Photo courtesy of Russ & Daughters

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New York City’s recognized Russ & Daughters appetizing shop and café will be bringing its century-old culinary bravado to Brooklyn with its first-ever location outside of Manhattan to open on the ground floor of the Brooklyn Navy Yard’s newly renovated Building 77.

The Brooklyn Navy Yard, now home to over 300 businesses, is experiencing its largest expansion since World War II — with the one-million-square-foot space that is Building 77 undergoing a $185 million renovation, and bringing with it over 3,000 jobs.

Russ & Daughters — known for its signature smoked fish, caviar, traditional bagels, bialys and baked goods — will lease 14,000 square feet of space on the building’s ground floor to be used as a public food hall and manufacturing space, according to the Navy Yard.

“Our investment in Building 77 means thousands more good jobs in the Navy Yard,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio, who alongside Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and the New York City Council helped allocate approximately $80 million towards Building 77’s renovation. “Russ & Daughters is a great New York City company, and it’s going to be the first of many to scale up and add new employees in this new manufacturing space.”

“We’re thrilled to welcome Russ & Daughters, a quintessential New York institution, as an anchor ground floor tenant at Building 77,” said Brooklyn Navy Yard President and CEO David Ehrenberg. “We are home to some of New York’s biggest and most innovative manufacturers and are continuing that tradition by adding Russ & Daughters to our community. Russ & Daughters will be an integral part of a bustling ecosystem at Building 77 and will also help attract and support a next generation of food entrepreneurs.”

The space will be used as a food manufacturing center as well as a retail space and bagel/sandwich shop — a strategy that Russ & Daughters’ owners hope will expand the company’s food production and distribution capabilities while also providing over 30 new jobs.

“When we visited the Brooklyn Navy Yard for the first time, we were amazed by the spectacular and vast space. Building 77 will open up this previously hidden gem to the public,” said Josh Russ Tupper, fourth generation owner of Russ & Daughters. “The excitement that will be generated from the intersection of food production and enjoyment in Building 77 will help solidify the Navy Yard’s place as a vibrant and unique location in New York to work and visit.”

The Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation (BNYDC) will be issuing a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI) for the remaining ground floor space at Building 77. The corporation is striving to lease to smaller food manufacturing and retail companies, with a strong preference for local and minority and women-owned business enterprises (MWBE).

“We encourage interested parties to reply to our RFEI to learn more about opportunities on the ground floor of Building 77,” Ehrenberg continued. “Food and drink have always been a powerful convener, and, once complete, this space will become the central gathering area for our growing Yard community of makers, doers and thinkers and will truly become a gateway to the Yard.”