Toastique Opens First Missouri Cafe in St. Louis November 21

Downtown St. Louis gets a new breakfast on November 21. Toastique opens its first Missouri cafe that Saturday at 100 North Broadway, Suite 130, a short walk from Gateway Arch National Park. Doors open at 8 a.m. for the launch, and the first 100 people through them receive $50 in Toastique reward dollars with any gourmet toast purchase. After opening day, the cafe keeps daily hours of 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The chain's name is its menu, stated plainly. Toastique is a fast-casual cafe built around gourmet toast, and around it smoothie bowls, cold-pressed juices and specialty coffee, made from scratch with locally sourced ingredients where the concept allows. It's a breakfast, brunch and lunch room rather than a dinner destination, and its hours say so. The 5 p.m. close is a bet on downtown's daytime population: office workers, Arch visitors and residents who want a morning place that isn't a drive-thru.

The people bringing it to Missouri are local. The franchise is operated by St. Louis residents Stephanie Munaco, Brenda Jones and Paul Larson, who are introducing a brand that started in Washington, D.C., where founder Brianna Keefe built the first Toastique. The chain has grown past 60 locations across more than 25 states, which puts St. Louis in the second wave of its expansion rather than the experiment phase. The format arriving downtown is a tested one.

That matters for the address. Downtown retail has spent years arguing that it needs reasons for people to come before 9 a.m. and stay past lunch, and a cafe with a national name, local owners and a park full of tourists two blocks away is a straightforward answer. The announcement also points to further expansion across the St. Louis metropolitan area, though no addresses or dates for additional cafes have been confirmed, and proposals in suburban planning records shouldn't be read as openings.

The opening-day mechanics reward exactly one behavior: arriving early. The $50 reward goes to the first 100 qualifying customers, not the first 100 visitors, and it requires a toast purchase. Anyone planning to collect should expect a line on North Broadway before 8 a.m. and should treat the reward dollars as what they are — a reason to come back a second time, which is the whole commercial idea.

On November 21, St. Louis will find out whether gourmet toast is a fad or a habit. The ingredients of an answer are all present: a proven chain, local operators, a landmark address and a morning menu in a downtown that keeps asking for one. The toast itself has to do the rest.