Cone & Steiner

What Cone & Steiner does

Cone & Steiner is a privately held neighborhood market operator based in Seattle, Washington, running a small chain of curated general-store-format retail locations. The company's offering spans fresh flowers and produce, dry goods, ice cream, prepared foods, specialty and local staple goods, craft beers, and fine wines, positioned as a modern reinterpretation of the pre-coffee-shop American general store that functions as a neighborhood gathering place. As of the most recent data, the company operates three retail storefronts in the Seattle metropolitan area: C&S Capitol Hill (532 19th Ave E), C&S Pioneer Square (135 S King St), and C&S Redmond (3460 156th Ave NE), with a downtown Seattle opening also referenced in 2017 press coverage.

The business operates a direct-to-consumer retail model with no e-commerce channel, no proprietary ordering app, and no documented technology platform beyond a Squarespace-hosted marketing site with newsletter signup. Pricing is set at the individual product level and is not publicly enumerated. Distribution is entirely through owned physical storefronts, with no third-party retail, marketplace, or wholesale channels identified. The company does not list patents, trademarks of record, formal partnerships, or institutional customers in the available data.

The brand was originally established in 1915 by Sam Cone and his brother-in-law Steiner in Seattle's SoDo neighborhood and was dormant for nearly a century before being revived in January 2014 by Dani Cone, Sam Cone's great-granddaughter, who also founded Fuel Coffee (2005) and High 5 Pie (2008). The business is founder-owned, with two small disclosed funding rounds (approximately $300K in 2016 and $200K in 2018) involving Keiretsu Capital-style angel investors, and no institutional, private equity, or parent-company ownership is identified. Headcount is reported in the 11-50 range.

Name

Cone & Steiner

Legal name

Cone & Steiner

Website

https://coneandsteiner.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1915

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Cone & Steiner is a Seattle-based neighborhood market operating three retail locations offering curated groceries, prepared foods, craft beer, wine, and specialty goods to neighborhood residents. The 1915 heritage brand was revived in 2014 by founder Dani Cone.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Specialty Neighborhood Grocery / Retail Market

NAICS

General Merchandise Retailers (455)

SIC

Retail-Variety Stores (5331), Retail-Convenience Stores (5412)

akta.pro primary industry

Traditional Variety Stores (General Variety & Five-and-Dime) (CRAEAGAA)

akta.pro secondary industry

Neighborhood Variety & Convenience Variety Stores (CRAGAJAC)

Keywords

• Neighborhood market
• Specialty grocery retail
• Craft beer and wine shop
• Fresh produce market
• General store

Headquarters

HQ city

Seattle

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices3 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Supply Chain, Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Retail Sales: Revenue generated from in-store sales of fresh produce and flowers, dry goods, ice cream, prepared foods, craft beers, fine wines, and specialty/local staple goods. Customers purchase directly at point-of-sale in physical store locations.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Cone & Steiner operates three neighborhood general-store/market locations in the Seattle metropolitan area (Capitol Hill, Pioneer Square, and Redmond) selling fresh flowers and produce, dry goods, ice cream, prepared foods, specialty and local staple goods, craft beers, and fine wines to walk-in customers. The concept is a modern revival of a 1915 general store, positioned as a curated community gathering spot rather than a full-line grocery or convenience store.

Product overview

Cone & Steiner is a single unified retail offering — a neighborhood general store/market that operates three physical locations in the Seattle area (Capitol Hill, Pioneer Square, and Redmond). The stores feature fresh flowers and produce, dry goods, ice cream, curated prepared foods, specialty and local goods, craft beers, and fine wines. The company operates as one product (the market) across three store locations rather than a platform-plus-modules architecture.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Cone & Steiner General Store (neighborhood market) A neighborhood market offering fresh flowers and produce, dry goods, ice cream, prepared foods, specialty and local goods, craft beers, and fine wines to walk-in retail customers across three Seattle-metro locations.

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves8 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Metropolitan Market: Seattle-based neighborhood grocer offering curated specialty, local, and prepared foods in a community-store format; directly comparable concept and geography to Cone & Steiner.
• PCC Community Markets: Community-owned grocery cooperative headquartered in Seattle, emphasizing local, organic, and specialty products with a neighborhood-store footprint — closely aligned with Cone & Steiner's positioning.
• Town & Country Markets: Independent Pacific Northwest neighborhood market chain offering specialty groceries, prepared foods, beer and wine in community-store settings; directly comparable operating model.
• New Seasons Market: Community-focused neighborhood grocery chain in the Pacific Northwest emphasizing local, specialty, and prepared foods; highly comparable operating concept outside the immediate Seattle geography.

Broad incumbents

• Whole Foods Market: Large national specialty/organic grocer with significant Seattle presence; competes for the same curated-shopper customer but at much greater scale and broader assortment.
• Trader Joe's: National specialty/value grocer with strong Seattle footprint; competes on curated specialty assortment and neighborhood-shopping convenience.

Emerging players

• Plum Market: Boutique specialty grocer with curated assortment and prepared foods in a neighborhood-store format; similar concept at small scale.
• Local 101 Corner Store / Bodega concepts: Independent neighborhood corner stores that combine curated convenience with specialty grocery and craft beverages; conceptual peers at the format level though no specific single company is identifiable.

Others

• Fuel Coffee: Also founded by Dani Cone, the Seattle specialty coffee chain shares the founder's community-store DNA and adjacent customer base, though the categories only partially overlap.
• High 5 Pie: Dani Cone's pie shop brand; adjacent prepared-food concept that shares founder DNA with Cone & Steiner but is a different retail format.

Market position

Strengths1 record

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat3 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/conesteiner
• Facebookfacebook.com/coneandsteiner
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/coneandsteiner

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds4 records

Investors1 record

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Cone & Steiner