One of New York City’s Best Bottle Shops Is Hiding in Penn Station

It’d be an understatement to say that no one enjoys Penn Station. When most New Yorkers and out-of-towners trek through the sterilely lit and highly trafficked train station, they have one goal in mind: Get in, and get out. But if there’s one reprieve for travelers slugging their suitcases through the Midtown terminal, it’s Penn Cellars.

For most of New York City’s wine cognoscenti, the best bottle shops reside below 14th Street or in Brooklyn. Retailers with niche, of-the-moment bottles on their shelves understandably target the cool, downtown crowd. Penn Cellars, however, is tucked into the busiest transit hub in North America, straddling 31st and 33rd Streets.

“You just can’t beat the foot traffic,” says David Bruno, who fronts the shop as the buyer. A group of investors owns Penn Cellars — leasing a spot in Penn Station is no cheap deal — but Bruno helms all its operations.

Penn Cellars in late December 2024 and has since amassed a vast consumer base, from commuters looking for a screwcap bottle for the train ride home to locals making a quick pitstop to ball out on a Burgundy before heading uptown. Its unlikely location is one thing, but Bruno’s commitment to stocking the store with an exceptionally wide range of producers — everything from Josh Cellars to Frank Cornelissen — in a building full of coffee shop franchises and fast-food chains is another.

Credit: Penn Cellars

Some may doubt Penn Station travelers are the kind of shoppers looking for an exceptional selection. Bruno, who cut his teeth in fine dining and fine wine retailing, wouldn’t disagree, but he would argue that those customers — even the ones who enter the shop asking for the same old mass-produced bottles — are open to giving his suggestions a try.

“I would rather somebody spend $20 on a rosé from Germany than buy Whispering Angel for $40,” he says. “Some people walk in and they’re like, ‘Is there any natural wine here?’ I’m like, ‘I’ll tell you when you pick up one that’s not.’”

He isn’t just spreading the word of good wine to Penn Station passersby. Selling cult wines with uber-low allocations is a tough market to work in, Bruno says, so it’s near impossible for suburban markets to carry such bottles. As the train hall is an intersection for so many in the Tri-State Area, Penn Cellars has become a nexus for bringing small-yield wines upstate, to Long Island, and to New Jersey.

“Some of our guests ask how they can get these wines out where they live,” he says. “That’s the great benefit of having a store where people then spread out. It creates demand in other places.”

In the coming days, Penn Cellars is set to open a nearby bar called Tracks. (Bruno is awaiting a final permit). The original Tracks was a Penn Station institution that shuttered in 2019 along with many other storefronts when the terminal underwent a massive renovation, and the new version will expand Penn Cellars into the on-premise channel, Bruno says, giving his staff even more of a chance to connect with travelers about wines they’re excited about.

For all of Bruno’s attention to introducing new bottles to his patrons, there’s another side to him that leans into one of the foremost trends in the alcohol industry today: Beverages packaged in cans and boxes.

Credit: Penn Cellars

Beyond just playing into the general consumer’s demand, there’s a bigger advantage for stocking ready-to-drink wines and spirits at Penn Cellars. Swaths of commuters come in for a post-work drink before catching the 6 o’clock train — precisely the archetype of on-the-go consumer that the RTD format targets. Bruno also stocks Penn Cellars’ counters with plastic cups, pebble ice, and straws for customers to make DIY cocktails to bring on the LIRR or NJ Transit. He calls the smashing demand for RTDs an “existential use case” for Penn Cellars.

“You can drink it immediately once you get out of my store,” he says. “It’s a pretty unique opportunity, and in terms of sustainability, it future-proofs our business. Alternative packaging is what I’ve been screaming about at every conference I go to, and I get to display that right in my store, which is really exciting.”

For now, however, traditionally bottled wines remain at the core of Penn Cellars. Whereas some commuters, daytrippers, and New Yorkers like to travel lightly, others prefer to leave Penn Station with their suitcases a few pounds heavier. But at least they’re heavier with some good bottles in tow.

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