Destination dining and immersive food experiences are driving leasing momentum across Macerich's Class A retail portfolio, with first-to-market locations from Eataly, Seafood City, and Din Tai Fung headlining a growing slate of experience-forward concepts.
The deals signal a broader shift in how premium mall operators are repositioning vacant and underperforming retail square footage. Rather than chase traditional soft-goods tenants, Macerich is aligning with operators whose food and beverage offerings function as traffic anchors — drawing shoppers who dwell longer, spend more broadly, and return with greater frequency than typical retail visits generate.
Why Food Is Winning
Eataly, the Italian food hall format that blends grocery, quick-service, and full-service dining under one roof, has become a marquee get for any mixed-use or enclosed mall project. Din Tai Fung, the Taiwanese dumpling chain with a near-cult following among urban diners, consistently generates long queues that spill foot traffic to neighboring tenants. Seafood City, a Filipino-American grocery and food court concept, speaks to the growing operator strategy of targeting underserved multicultural consumer bases with destination grocery-and-dining hybrids. All three represent categories that cannot be replicated online — a core requirement for any tenant strategy built to withstand e-commerce headwinds.
For restaurant and foodservice operators watching the evolution of non-traditional venue formats, the Macerich portfolio activity offers a real-world case study in how landlords are now actively recruiting culinary concepts as the cornerstone of their tenant mix rather than an afterthought to fashion and entertainment anchors.
Operator Implications
The trend carries direct implications for multi-unit operators and emerging restaurant groups evaluating expansion sites. Class A mall landlords, once considered difficult partners for food operators given high build-out costs and restrictive lease structures, are increasingly coming to the table with incentive packages and flexible terms designed to attract culinary draws. That dynamic improves negotiating leverage for operators with recognizable concepts or a proven ability to generate dwell time.
Food halls and experience-driven dining have been a sustained theme in hospitality real estate strategy for several years, but the Macerich deals suggest the pipeline of first-to-market signings in premium centers remains active. As Food & Beverage Magazine has tracked across its coverage of the food and beverage industry, the blurring of retail and restaurant formats is reshaping how operators think about channel strategy, real estate footprint, and brand positioning simultaneously.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
