The Situation: The MINA Group had recently purchased the restaurant property at 2120 Greenwich Street in San Francisco, the restaurant group’s first wholly-owned dining space, and had decided to turn it into a pop-up, “test kitchen” for celebrity chef Michael Mina and his critically-acclaimed culinary team. The first pop-up, a yet-to-be-named concept inspired by Chef Mina and RN74 Chef Adam Sobel’s respective culinary heritage, was launching in a mere six weeks.

The Solution: The MINA Group hired Ellipses. We worked with the team on cementing the pop-up’s name, which became Middle’terranea, and the overall concept’s name: The MINA Test Kitchen. Once we finalized messaging for both, which included working with MINA Group’s new ticketing partner Resy, we launched a media campaign focusing on the Bay Area, introducing both concepts to the food, beverage and lifestyle press. We first ensured we had excellent food photography and portraits of both chefs and then, through strategic media pitching, we maximized coverage of the announcement. To ensure ongoing buzz, we also hosted a successful media preview of the Middle’terranea menu with Chefs Mina and Sobel and, once the concept launched, ensured key influencers and critics were invited in to experience the full Middle’terranea menu as our guests.

The Results: Middle’terranea debuted on July 23, 2015. We garnered more than 20 press hits in a six-week period, June 29 through August 15, 2015, in print and online media outlets in the targeted Bay Area market, totaling approximately 47,000 views and 5,610 social shares. Tickets sold out for the first two weeks of dinners well before opening night, and attendance never waned, reaching full capacity night after night. Ellipses helped set the stage for the next pop-up, Little Italy, which launched in late October, and launched the third and fourth pop-ups in 2016, called The Company and Diane’s Bloody Mary Brunch.

Photo credit: Kevin McCullough