The internet goes kosher

With over 15,000 products and free delivery, Kosher.com hopes to change the way we shop

By Michael Orbach Issue of August 21, 2009 / 1 Elul 5769 On Monday, Cedarhurst becomes the center of the online kosher world. That’s the day the revamped Kosher.com goes live, offering free delivery of over 15,000 kosher products in Nassau County, Manhattan, Riverdale and parts of the Bronx and Brooklyn. Perhaps more importantly, after two years of development and advances in packaging, Kosher.com will be able to ship any of its goods worldwide — a kosher food happening that may be the best thing since sliced challah. In the coming months, Kosher.com plans to expand its free delivery area to other parts of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Chairman Chesky Kauftheil hatched the concept eight years ago during the dotcom era but felt it was “too early for its time.” He held off pursuing the idea until two years ago when he judged the market to be ready. He originally thought to base Kosher.com out of Gourmet Glatt Emporium in Cedarhurst so as to have a source of fresh products with steady turnover. Negotiations fell through when the store’s previous owners became embroiled in a messy dispute with the Vaad HaKashrus of the Five Towns and Far Rockaway,  so Kauftheil bought Gourmet Glatt and now Kosher.com’s operations are based out of the store’s warehouse. “Glatt is a good anchor,” Kauftheil explained. “We’re using a lot of the same merchandise. We’re bringing a very high quality product out to Kosher.com.” “The kosher market is viewed as a niche market, but it’s a massive niche market,” said CEO Aaron Dobrinsky. “You’ll hear numbers from $40 billion to $200 billion. And the demand is always there so, to me, we’re solving a need in the marketplace. The demand is there, the necessity is required and we’re facilitating the ease of delivery.” 45% of kosher consumers live outside of the major metropolitan area, Dobrinsky said, and while they have access to common kosher goods available in common stores, more specialized items are harder to get. “Maybe they can get Empire frozen chickens but they can't get fresh meat or Osem croutons or Middle Eastern couscous. Do they have a kosher bakery? Do they have anything more than challah?” He wouldn’t discuss numbers but Dobrinsky said that the unpublicized test version of the site already has three trucks going into Manhattan daily. “If Kosher.com is capable of delivering even a fraction of what Amazon does for the consumer world or what FreshDirect does for the general produce world, Kosher.com should be revolutionary,” said Dani Klein, head editor of the kosher travel blog Yeahthatskosher.com and a social media marketing consultant. Elie Rosenfeld, CEO of Joseph Jacobs Advertising, a ninety-year-old communications firm specializing in the Jewish market, was equally positive. “Kosher consumers in the metro New York-area have been looking for a convenient, upscale opportunity to buy groceries and kosher provisions. With a well-thought out and strategic plan from Kosher.com it seems like that is really in sight,” Rosenfeld said. “Other people have failed doing this in both the kosher and general market,” he noted, “and the people that are out there, Fresh Direct and Peapod, in their current form, have learned from many of the mistakes. The opportunity for Kosher.com to build on that seems to be great.” The redesigned website also hopes to become the center of a vibrant online kosher community. Jamie Geller, dubbed “the Kosher Rachel Ray” by the Miami Herald for her popular “Quick and Kosher” cookbook, has been named CFO — Chief Foodie Officer, that is — and will oversee a steady offering of articles, recipes and forums, as well as video features about “the kosher life-style.” “We’re the world’s largest supermarket, but in essence, we want to be the singular destination for all things kosher,” Geller explained. Geller will draw on her background as a senior writer and producer at HBO where, among other responsibilities, she ran marketing campaigns for popular television shows like The Sopranos. Geller views Kosher.com as a combination of FreshDirect for the local market and an Amazon with an extensive inventory that can be shipped anywhere, at prices that she says will be competitively in the range of most kosher groceries. She also believes that the site will attract a wide demographic, appealing not just to the Orthodox kosher consumer, but to traditional Jews, and even non-traditional kosher consumers. “It’s not just people who are keeping kosher to the strictest level; [People] interested in some connection to Judaism, on Rosh Hashana they’ll be searching for gefilte fish recipes. This is some aspect of their heritage they want to connect to and we’re here for them. If it’s kosher meat or just challah or wine, or exploring what it means to be kosher,” Geller said. “And it’s not just kosher. It’s vegetarians; it’s [Muslims for] halal; it’s people who are interested in ethnic, the same way they’re interested in Mexican and Thai food. People believe [kosher] is healthier. I have tons of non-kosher neighbors who only bought meat from the kosher meat section.” Geller expects a diverse community on the site’s forums. “People who love food come in all shapes and sizes,” she said. In separate conversations, Kauftheil, Dobrinsky and Geller, all who whom are Orthodox, mentioned a religious aspect — the mitzvah of making kosher food more accessible. “We’re not doing charity here,” Kauftheil said, “but we’re doing business that is good. We’re bringing kosher food to people who don’t have it. There are people who are leaning towards kosher but they just don’t have access. I hope we make a lot of money, but if we can get several people to make that step [of becoming kosher], it’ll be worth it.” So far, the early version of Kosher.com has seen its share of interesting orders, including shipping a complete Passover Seder to Afghanistan and kosher jelly doughnuts to a prison in Hawaii. “Three days to get there,” Kauftheil remarked. “Somebody in the prison needs jelly doughnuts for Chanukah.”

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