Local restaurateur Frank Bonanno opened Milk Market in 2018 before selling it in 2023 to Sage Hospitality Group. (Courtesy Denver Milk Market)
Milk Market’s new owner is shaking it up.
The food hall, which opened in LoDo’s Dairy Block in 2018, is adding three new concepts. The arrivals of Konjo Ethiopian Food, Lucky Bird Fried Chicken and YumCha Noodles & Dumplings brings the total number of vendors to 11 at 1800 Wazee St.
“We’re really looking forward to just revamping the Denver Milk Market and giving it a new life and new face,” General Manager Scott Bellot told BusinessDen.
Bellot’s employer, Sage Hospitality Group — which operates the Maven Hotel in Dairy Block — bought Milk Market from local restaurateur Frank Bonnano in 2023. Bellot, an industry veteran who has led restaurants for the likes of Gordon Ramsey, joined the Milk Market team last November.
This will be the second location for Konjo, whose owners Fetien Gebre-Michael and Yoseph Assefa operate out of Edgewater Public Market and a food truck. Lucky Bird also serves its tenders and sandwiches in Edgewater and has another spot at Blue Bird Market in Silverthorne.
Konjo’s beef plate is one of several dishes from Ethiopian natives Fetien Gebre-Michael and Yoseph Assefa. (Courtesy Milk Market)
At Milk Market, both of those open Tuesday. YumCha, an Asian street food spot by ChoLon owner Lon Symensma, will open by July 4, Bellot said. This will be the second YumCha for Symensma, who closed its original location on the 16th Street Mall earlier this year but still operates in Central Park.
All three will rent a space in the 18,000-square-foot food hall, a change from the Bonanno days when all the stalls were owned and operated by the chef. Bellot said this is part of a broader strategy for the new ownership group. He estimated that, in the future, as much as 80% of Milk Market’s restaurants will be leased and run by outside vendors.
“We are looking at a multitiered blend right now. We, of course, will learn from these first three coming in and find our positives and negatives and reassess as we go forward,” Bellot said. “We’re also looking at some bigger picture agreements where we will actually pay a franchising fee.”
Sage will still run the bar and several other concepts. One of them, poke spot East3, recently revamped its menu. Bellot said the salad stall Green Huntsmen might be converted in the coming months as well.
“There’s a lot of balls in the air,” Bellot said through a laugh. “But being able to bring in known Colorado brands that people already love is such an easy lift for the team.”
Bellot estimates that sales are up 12% to 16% year over year. When Bonanno sold Milk Market, he told BusinessDen that sales had been cut in half compared with before the pandemic.
Scott Bellot
“(Sage is) better equipped to deal with something that big,” Bonanno said in September 2023. “They’re a big organization, so they probably see things and are able to fix things we’re unable to. They have a lot of experience behind them.”
Bellot credits the boost to having more programming, like trivia, brunches and, this month, Pride events. Those, along with a new game room that made its debut in the fall, are part of a push to capture Denver’s dinner crowd.
“The lunch business is taken care of. We’re downtown, it’s easy,” he said. “If I were on 16th Street Mall, we’d be having a different conversation. But with our location and having six floors of offices above us, we do a very healthy lunch business here.”
He said that alone is a sign of success in “a somewhat depressed economy.” Any growth at all, he said, is a positive, and he anticipates increasing sales around 10% in each of the coming years.
“When I got here, I realized there is a lot of underutilized space in the market. Bonanno had very grandiose plans so he gave his restaurants a massive footprint, which made sense for what he was doing,” Bellot said. “But for a true food hall, every concept can be run out of half the space they currently have.
“This is just step one in a massive plan for us, and hopefully part of a plan for the Dairy Block as a whole, which definitely is our goal,” he continued. “But let’s get these three in, see how it works and get it buttoned down.”
Local restaurateur Frank Bonanno opened Milk Market in 2018 before selling it in 2023 to Sage Hospitality Group. (Courtesy Denver Milk Market)
Milk Market’s new owner is shaking it up.
The food hall, which opened in LoDo’s Dairy Block in 2018, is adding three new concepts. The arrivals of Konjo Ethiopian Food, Lucky Bird Fried Chicken and YumCha Noodles & Dumplings brings the total number of vendors to 11 at 1800 Wazee St.
“We’re really looking forward to just revamping the Denver Milk Market and giving it a new life and new face,” General Manager Scott Bellot told BusinessDen.
Bellot’s employer, Sage Hospitality Group — which operates the Maven Hotel in Dairy Block — bought Milk Market from local restaurateur Frank Bonnano in 2023. Bellot, an industry veteran who has led restaurants for the likes of Gordon Ramsey, joined the Milk Market team last November.
This will be the second location for Konjo, whose owners Fetien Gebre-Michael and Yoseph Assefa operate out of Edgewater Public Market and a food truck. Lucky Bird also serves its tenders and sandwiches in Edgewater and has another spot at Blue Bird Market in Silverthorne.
Konjo’s beef plate is one of several dishes from Ethiopian natives Fetien Gebre-Michael and Yoseph Assefa. (Courtesy Milk Market)
At Milk Market, both of those open Tuesday. YumCha, an Asian street food spot by ChoLon owner Lon Symensma, will open by July 4, Bellot said. This will be the second YumCha for Symensma, who closed its original location on the 16th Street Mall earlier this year but still operates in Central Park.
All three will rent a space in the 18,000-square-foot food hall, a change from the Bonanno days when all the stalls were owned and operated by the chef. Bellot said this is part of a broader strategy for the new ownership group. He estimated that, in the future, as much as 80% of Milk Market’s restaurants will be leased and run by outside vendors.
“We are looking at a multitiered blend right now. We, of course, will learn from these first three coming in and find our positives and negatives and reassess as we go forward,” Bellot said. “We’re also looking at some bigger picture agreements where we will actually pay a franchising fee.”
Sage will still run the bar and several other concepts. One of them, poke spot East3, recently revamped its menu. Bellot said the salad stall Green Huntsmen might be converted in the coming months as well.
“There’s a lot of balls in the air,” Bellot said through a laugh. “But being able to bring in known Colorado brands that people already love is such an easy lift for the team.”
Bellot estimates that sales are up 12% to 16% year over year. When Bonanno sold Milk Market, he told BusinessDen that sales had been cut in half compared with before the pandemic.
Scott Bellot
“(Sage is) better equipped to deal with something that big,” Bonanno said in September 2023. “They’re a big organization, so they probably see things and are able to fix things we’re unable to. They have a lot of experience behind them.”
Bellot credits the boost to having more programming, like trivia, brunches and, this month, Pride events. Those, along with a new game room that made its debut in the fall, are part of a push to capture Denver’s dinner crowd.
“The lunch business is taken care of. We’re downtown, it’s easy,” he said. “If I were on 16th Street Mall, we’d be having a different conversation. But with our location and having six floors of offices above us, we do a very healthy lunch business here.”
He said that alone is a sign of success in “a somewhat depressed economy.” Any growth at all, he said, is a positive, and he anticipates increasing sales around 10% in each of the coming years.
“When I got here, I realized there is a lot of underutilized space in the market. Bonanno had very grandiose plans so he gave his restaurants a massive footprint, which made sense for what he was doing,” Bellot said. “But for a true food hall, every concept can be run out of half the space they currently have.
“This is just step one in a massive plan for us, and hopefully part of a plan for the Dairy Block as a whole, which definitely is our goal,” he continued. “But let’s get these three in, see how it works and get it buttoned down.”
