Last Call for Classic Coffee Shop, Decades-Old Icon of Hester Street
It’s last call for Classic Coffee Shop on Hester Street. Last day of business for the cozy luncheonette – on the block for forty-plus years is Christmas Eve.
Closure is not due to any rent hike. Simply, the lease is up this month, and owner Carmine Morales has decided to retire. The pandemic has affected business, yes, but we’re told that “he just thinks it’s time to go.”
Sigh.
“The landlords of the building have been the owners since my father took over the store in 1976 and have been wonderful to both my father and my brother,” his brother Manny tells us in an email.
The Classic Coffee Shop has been serving from 56 Hester Street for over forty years. The location is one of the longest continually operated diners around here. Before his father inherited the business in 1976, it was also a diner by one Benny Steinberg.
The pandemic purge continues unabated.
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