Can this new café restore Boat Basin to its former glory?

When Umair Khalili returned home from his studies in London, he discovered he couldn’t quite find a croissant he liked in Karachi.

He realised why soon enough — you simply can’t make good croissants with locally available flour... or butter... or ovens, for that matter — but by then, he was already deeply invested in the art of baking.

Khalili had committed to opening a bread boutique that would satisfy fellow gourmands while raising the bar for Karachi’s café culture, which he felt has been overtaken by mediocre food and service.

Enter Marcels

Come February 2018, Marcel’s will open its doors at Karachi’s Boat Basin, reclaiming the once happening Pizza Hut spot and injecting new life and energy into its environs.

The cafe takes its name from fictional world traveller Marcel Le Roux, the son of perhaps the best bakers of Paris, who embarked on a long-winding journey from Europe across the Mediterranean and Atlantic. After stops in Australia, Japan, Russia and China, Marcel put his adventure to rest in Karachi.

So, what’s on offer at Marcel’s, apart from croissants as good as they have them in Europe?

Among the café’s other specialties are macarons and a spread of sandwiches that includes croque monsier and madame, open face sandwiches on rye toast, BLT and bahn mi. Of course, customers will be spoiled for choice of bread with their meals.

According to Marcel’s co-founder Junaid Aziz, who is meticulously crafting the brand, the essence of this new café is not in the 55 kinds of bread available at its bread boutique, but the customers’ experience of being offered “excellence along every dimension.”

At Marcel's, customers will not only enjoy high-quality food prepared by a team trained by top chefs and baking consultants but also chic interiors designed by Naheed Mashooqullah, beautiful artwork to illustrate Marcel Le Roux’s story across the store, a playlist that’s been thoughtfully curated over two months and ample space that will accommodate about 160 people.

At the heart of it all is a deep desire to satisfy the customer’s every whim and need.

“The manager at Marcel’s will assess each customer’s individual needs,” tells Aziz. “If they were in any other country, they would get that kind of service. How long will customers get a limited, marginalised experience of life in Pakistan? A more personalised experience is what they deserve.”

"The Pizza Hut at Boat Basin was the place where many people would hang out with their friends or feasted at their first all-you-can-eat Ramazan deal. Through Marcel’s, we want to brighten up Boat Basin again.” — Marcel's co-founder Junaid Aziz

To achieve this personalised experience, Aziz intimately studied the market for Marcel’s and profiled the various types of customers the café could expect to receive. Like, young professionals who are indulgent but still look for value-for-money; or savvy socialities, who are particular about quality and shape the opinions of their following by sharing their positive experiences.

In brief, Marcel’s will be a café that offers great food, ambiance and service. But isn’t that what they all promise?

What’s really different about Marcel’s

We hear stories of the buzzing Karachi of yore — the Paris of the East, as some have called it — but how many can claim to have made an effort to restore the city’s cultural scene to its former glory?

This is one of the reasons why Marcel’s has opened shop in Boat Basin. It wants to recall a better Karachi and help revive one of its iconic locales.

“The Pizza Hut at Boat Basin was the first franchise to come to Pakistan in the mid-90s. At that time, Karachi was the city where every good thing started off from. For many people, it was the place where they would hang out with their friends or got beat up in a phadda for the first time or feasted on their first all-you-can-eat Ramazan deal.”

“It pains me to see how dirty and ugly Boat Basin has become now. Through Marcel’s, we want to brighten up the whole space again,” says Aziz.

The hope is that business owners at Boat Basin will be inspired to improve the look of their eateries and uplift the neighbourhood as a whole.

"How long will customers get a limited, marginalised experience of life in Pakistan?" asks Marcel's co-founder Junaid Aziz. "A more personalised experience is what they deserve.”

Stressing on the need for brands to add value to the neighbourhoods they enter, Aziz talks about how high-end food places in Karachi tend to make people’s lives miserable instead. They add to the traffic woes of a locality and neglect to take action for its upkeep by the authorities, he says.

Most restaurants in Karachi offer very little in terms of an experience, Aziz feels. He says they function more like dukaans or shops, meeting only their customers’ most basic needs like hunger, which could also be fulfilled by a mere 75 rupees.

But customers pay a lot more than that, and Aziz feels that it’s up to customers to ensure they get an experience worth their money.

“Instead of accepting what’s being given to us in the name of customer service, we start asking questions from the brand.” It’s the kind of accountability we ought to seek from bigger institutions.

For these reasons, Aziz wants to see Marcel’s serve as an incubator, to inspire Pakistan’s youth to get pro-active.

“I want Marcel’s customers to come and discuss their ideas instead of gossip about what Kareena Kapoor was wearing or what Ahmed Shehzad did in the last cricket match. I want them to meet interesting, like-minded people and talk about bigger things like what they want to do in life, what they want to do for Pakistan.”

This content has been produced in paid partnership with Marcel's.