Retailer Focus: Snack Box
A Shipping Container Turned Modern Street Food Vendor with Gourmet Flair
Snack Box, a Store Design winner at the NRF show in January, is innovative pop-up architecture design at its best. Recently re-located to Broadway between 45th and 46th Street in New York, SnackBox debuted in Times Square October 2011.
Designed by aedifica and muvbox, SnackBox is artfully constructed out of a 200 sq feet recycled shipping container with bold black and white graphics. The compact structure ideally fits into the limited space constraints of the pedestrian-only traffic areas, yet stands out amidst the visually saturated area of New York’s Times Square and Broadway districts.
SnackBox serves iconic NY street food with gourmet flair, serving up lobster rolls, donuts, hot dogs and coffee. It vanishes into a standard shipping container at night, and then in two minutes in the morning, deploys back into a pop-up restaurant with a bar and awning
This modern-day reinvention of the old-fashion canteen is 20 feet (6 meters) long, movable and entirely self-sufficient. A water supply tank is embedded into the floor and power comes from hybrid energy systems combining electric batteries and a generator. In the winter, the recovered heat from the generator is used to heat the interior for the staff.
Key lessons from SnackBox:
• Use simple yet bold graphical elements for contrast and to stand out in a colorful city environment.
• An elaborate yet practical reinvention and repurposing of a conventional shipping container.
• Compact box structure enables prime restaurant locations amidst foot traffic and easy relocation.
• Enhancing the traditional street vendor food with addition of gourmet food selections.
Through the unique repurposing of a standard box container and through the development of its visual identity and brand, SnackBox succeeds to convey the “NY personality” to the pop-up restaurant and continues to draw passerbys for a snack.
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