The second Saturday of the month means one thing at The Landing: engines idling, coffee cups going cold in the morning heat, and a loose semicircle of exotics, imports, and vintage muscle parked along Sail View Lane for Waterset's monthly Cars & Coffee. Free coffee courtesy of the Landing Cafe, sponsors from Leaven Law Injury Lawyers to JB's Mobile Car Wash & Detailing chipping in to keep it running, and a crowd that shows up whether it's February or the middle of August.
A short drive away on Paseo Al Mar Boulevard, a different kind of Saturday morning is playing out. A handful of storefronts sit finished and empty, still wearing "coming soon" signage more than a year after the shells went up. The contrast is the whole story of The Yard at Waterset right now: a retail center that was supposed to be the community's one-stop-shop for daily life is filling in slower than advertised, even as the businesses that do land there are signing leases built to last a decade.
What's actually open right now
The Yard sits on Paseo Al Mar Boulevard between U.S. 41 and Waterset Boulevard, and its first phase covers 27,485 square feet, according to the property's commercial listing on LoopNet. By January 2025, five tenants had opened their doors in that footprint: Planet Smoothie, Wingstop, Crunch Fitness, The Learning Experience, and Pet Paradise, per reporting from the Osprey Observer.
More than a year later, in February 2026, four more operators signed ten-year leases at the center: Rock N Roll Sushi, IMX Pilates, Stretch Zone, and Perspire Sauna Studio, all arranged through Acre Commercial Real Estate, according to Bokor's Corner. That's nine confirmed operators across roughly two years of leasing activity in a center that was originally pitched as a quick, walkable answer to everything from dining to fitness to beauty.
If you've been watching the storefronts fill in one at a time rather than all at once, that's not your imagination. It's the actual pace.
"It was important to open here because we really wanted to be part of our community and support the area in which we chose to live."
That's Jennifer Babinec, who runs Planet Smoothie with her husband Jason. The couple has lived in Waterset since 2018 and had franchise options in Bradenton, Clearwater, and Tampa before choosing their own neighborhood instead, per the Osprey Observer. Within their first month open, Jennifer reported serving over 100 customers a day, a number that says less about smoothies and more about how much daily foot traffic Waterset already generates for whoever shows up first.
The restaurant everyone's still waiting on
The most anticipated name on The Yard's tenant list isn't open yet. Hypocrites Row is planned as a 5,525-square-foot full-service sit-down restaurant, described by area reporting as something Apollo Beach has been "severely lacking and desperately wanting." Its ownership group, Circus Hospitality Group, told local outlet Bokor's Corner in January 2025 that the building shell was complete and the team was targeting a mid-2025 opening, with the ownership offering this description of the concept:
"HR will be a full service, polished casual restaurant."
As of that January 2025 update, no firm opening date beyond that mid-year target had been announced, and no confirmed opening has surfaced in reporting since. A restaurant with a finished shell and a name on the door for close to a year and a half is its own kind of local landmark. If you've driven past that empty storefront wondering what happened, the honest answer is that the ownership group has been quieter about their timeline than their original excitement suggested.
A second restaurant, moving faster
While Hypocrites Row sat in limbo, a different operator moved with more urgency. The Greyson, an upscale-casual sports restaurant and bar with existing locations in Palmetto and Lakewood Ranch, announced plans in early 2026 for its first Hillsborough County location at 6192 Paseo Al Mar Boulevard, just down the street from the rest of The Yard. Co-owner Russell Matthes told trade outlet Business Debut the team was targeting the second week of March 2026 for opening, with a six-to-eight week cushion built in depending on the contractor's schedule. The build-out runs about 3,500 square feet with roughly 160 seats between the dining room and a 600-square-foot patio.
Matthes also told Business Debut the same ownership group is eyeing a Wesley Chapel location, with a late 2026 target if that project stays on schedule. Whatever else you take from The Yard's rollout, restaurant operators are still betting on this stretch of Apollo Beach. They're just not all moving at the same speed.
Why the slip isn't a warning sign
The clearest evidence of how far behind The Yard is running comes from its own leasing paperwork. Phase 2, a larger 54,690-square-foot expansion, was originally advertised for fourth-quarter 2025 delivery, according to the Osprey Observer's January 2025 report. The center's current marketing listing through SRS Real Estate Partners now puts Phase 2 delivery at fourth-quarter 2026, a full year later than the center's own original timeline.
A year-long slip on a retail build-out would normally read as a red flag. Here it reads differently, because of what's happening alongside the delay rather than despite it. Ten-year commercial leases with five-year renewal options, the terms signed by Rock N Roll Sushi and Perspire Sauna Studio in February 2026, aren't the kind of commitment nervous operators make in a market they're unsure about. Franchisees are looking at a residential base that keeps growing behind them: The Yard sits within walking distance of 236 units at The Citizen at Waterset and 400 more at Ridley at Waterset, with additional multifamily construction planned nearby, according to commercial listing data. The slow fill-in isn't a sign that demand is soft. It's a sign that the people building out this corner of Waterset can afford to be patient about who they let in.
The rest of the calendar doesn't wait
None of this has put a dent in how residents actually spend their weekends, because most of Waterset's social calendar was never built around The Yard in the first place. Cars & Coffee runs the second Saturday of every month at The Landing, rain or shine, powered by a rotating list of local sponsors. On the other side of the community, Waterset Under the Lights, the flag football league sponsored by Under Armour, runs its spring season on Friday nights at the Southshore Sportsplex at Waterset on Waterset Boulevard, with registration for the 2026 fall season already open.
Those two fixtures, one for car people and one for families with kids on a field, say something The Yard's leasing timeline can't: the community doesn't need a finished town center to have a rhythm. It already has one. The Yard is catching up to it, not the other way around.
What this means if you live here
If you've been checking that empty storefront every few months hoping for news, the honest read is that patience is the right posture, not frustration. The businesses that have signed on, especially the ones committing to ten-year terms in 2026, are a better signal of where this corner of Apollo Beach is headed than any original opening date ever was. Hypocrites Row may still surprise everyone with an announcement. The Greyson likely already has its doors open by the time you read this, five months past its March target. Either way, the neighborhood around The Yard isn't waiting on either one to feel finished.
If you're weighing what any of this means for your own plans in Waterset, whether that's the value of a home near a maturing retail corridor or simply understanding how a growing pocket of Apollo Beach actually functions day to day, the Brenda Wade Team has spent years watching these patterns play out across Greater Tampa Bay. Reach out anytime you want a straight read on what's really happening in your corner of the map.
