Manhattan Bagel Gains Top Honors in Reader Surveys

New World Coffee-Manhattan Bagel, Inc. (Nasdaq: NWCI) today announced that its Manhattan Bagel subsidiary was recently voted best bagel shop in newspaper reader surveys in the Atlanta, Ga. and Monmouth/Ocean, New Jersey markets.

Manhattan Bagel, which has won similar honors in numerous markets across the country, was the top voter-getter in the bagel shop category in 'Readers Choice' surveys sponsored by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and, for the third year in a row, by the Asbury Park Press. The chain has 12 franchised stores in the metro Atlanta market and 20 in its home territory of Monmouth and Ocean counties.

The Journal-Constitution is the largest daily newspaper in the Southeast and the Asbury Park Press is the second largest daily in New Jersey.

"These awards provide further recognition that consumers prefer the taste of our authentic, New York-style bagels,'' said Ramin Kamfar, New World Chairman and CEO. .''

Among other recent honors, in August Manhattan Bagel was voted best bagel shop in the Boston suburbs in Community Newspaper Company's Readers Choice Awards, and on September 29 the restaurant critic of Palm Springs' Desert Sun newspaper gave the chain's Palm Desert, CA store's food a 3-1/2 star rating (out of four). During 1999, Manhattan Bagel was one of two stores rated "Top of the heap'' in a Washington Post food critic's blind test of products from six area bagel stores. Also in 1999, the Asbury Park Press' sister publication, the Home News Tribune, named the company as best bagel restaurant in Central New Jersey. The company's bagels also took top honors in Morris County, NJ in a reader's poll by the Daily Record.

New World Coffee-Manhattan Bagel, Inc. currently franchises, licenses or owns stores under its four brands in 26 states and Washington, D.C. The Company is vertically integrated in bagel dough manufacturing and coffee roasting, with plants in New Jersey, California and Connecticut.