Restaurant chain Cosi will open its first North Shore location this summer at 1740 Sherman Ave.

It will occupy the space left by Sherman Restaurant, which closed its doors in February after 30 years of business.

Cosi’s menu offers coffee drinks, sandwiches, salads, soups, bagels and desserts. Customers who order the trademark s’mores platter roast their own marshmallows over a small flame at their table.

The Deerfield, Ill.-based company chose Evanston for its newest restaurant because of the “sophisticated” target customers in the city, said Patrick Donnellan, the company’s vice president of business development.

“There’s a strong presence of our target customers with the university and in the local community,” Donnellan said. “The unique flavors, taste and environment of our product will appeal to people in Evanston.”

The “innovative” menu takes items like a roast beef sandwich and adds a unique twist, like wasabi as a condiment instead of horseradish, Donnellan said.

Some Northwestern students are excited to walk to Cosi from campus instead of riding the El to one of the downtown Chicago locations.

But Cosi isn’t a place to study like Panera, said Weinberg sophomore Christina Jacquet. She said she plans on visiting the restaurant “if it’s not expensive.”

Sandwiches are $5.99 to $6.39 and salads are $5.49 to $6.59. Food can be purchased at the counter, and table service is offered at night.

But Cosi’s prices might hinder students from becoming frequent diners, said Joelle Contorno, a Communication freshman, who called the menu expensive.

“I don’t see it as a place where students can go to regularly,” she said.

Cosi will join Sherman Avenue neighbors Starbucks, Panera Bread, Einstein Bagels and the Unicorn Cafe in the coffee and bakery market.

“(Cosi) tends to appeal to a more sophisticated consumer,” Donnellan said. “It’s really that presence of people we are looking to serve.”

But the addition of another franchised restaurant to downtown Evanston takes away from the character of the area, said Contorno, who works at the Unicorn Cafe.

“It makes every city the same,” she said.

Cosi has seven Chicago locations and three restaurants in the south and west suburbs. As of Jan. 1, Cosi owned and operated 92 restaurants in 17 states including New York, California, Massachusetts, Washington and Florida.

Managers at the Evanston Cosi will begin hiring about two weeks before the restaurant opens, Donnellan said.

“We will absolutely hire people from the community and from the university,” he said. “We’ve had great success with that in the past with locations near other universities.”

Reach Beth Murtagh at [email protected].