The first food and drink tenant inside Michigan Central Station since 1988 is a coffee and donut shop from the east side. Yellow Light Coffee opened inside the Station's first-floor retail arcade Friday, December 6, marking 36 years since anyone last sold a sandwich on the property. The grand opening did not feature a ribbon.
Instead, Detroit community leaders and the shop's owners ceremonially sliced through a string of donuts, which is the kind of detail Yellow Light has built its brand on. The ownership group is the same crew behind Green Dot Stables, Johnny Noodle King, and Blitzen's on Bagley, all under In-Laws Hospitality. Christine and Jacques Driscoll co-founded Yellow Light with partner Niko Dimitrijevic in 2020, opening the first location as a Jefferson-Chalmers drive-thru at 14447 East Jefferson.
The Michigan Central location skips the drive-thru. Customers walk in, order house-roasted coffee, scratch donuts, or a biscuit sandwich, and either eat at the counter or take it back into the building they're spending the morning touring. The Station had drawn 167,000 visitors since reopening in June, and Yellow Light is the first place to sell them anything.
"Offering our in-house roasted coffee, scratch-made doughnuts, and biscuit sandwiches to Corktown and Southwest is beyond exciting for our growth in Detroit," Christine Driscoll said in a statement when the deal was announced. The Station closed in 1988 after decades as one of the country's grandest train terminals. It sat empty until Ford bought it in 2018 and began the multi-year, multi-billion-dollar restoration that culminated in the June 2024 reopening concert and Ford's announcement that it would move workers into three floors.
Retail came after. Yellow Light is a tight little operation. House-roasted coffee, donuts made on-site, biscuits split and stuffed with breakfast components in the southern style.
Yellow Light Coffee, inside Michigan Central Station, Corktown, Detroit.
