South Howard Avenue, Tampa: Who's Behind the Restaurants in 2026?

For most of the last decade, a restaurant on South Howard Avenue that survived its first year tended to stay for the whole decade. SoHo Saloon ran for fourteen years before it closed for good in March. Daily Eats served the same regulars for twenty years before it closed too. That was the rhythm South Tampa learned to expect: long tenures, slow turnover, a handful of names you could count on seeing every time you walked from Bayshore up toward Platt Street.

This year brought a mix of openings, closures, and changes in operators. Some of the businesses involved are connected to hospitality groups that also operate at other nearby addresses. If you live along South Howard or in Hyde Park, you may have noticed familiar operator names behind different storefronts.

Restaurant Changes Across South Tampa

Start with the timeline, because the pace is the story. In January, a tequila-forward supper club called Quiote took over the old Ciro's space. In February, word came that Haven, one of South Tampa's longer-standing restaurants, would close, with a Bern's Steak House-backed seafood concept led by Haven's own executive chef, Chad Johnson, set to take the space in fall 2027. In March, SoHo Saloon shut its doors after fourteen years at 410 S Howard Ave. Later that month, The Landon opened in the former 717 South space on Bayshore, one of the more recognizable addresses in the city. By June, the twenty-year diner Daily Eats had closed and reopened weeks later as Meeting House, and Fresh Kitchen cut the ribbon on a new flagship at 1719 W Kennedy Blvd, with Mayor Jane Castor on hand for the ceremony.

Taken together, these developments include restaurant openings, closures, and transitions across South Tampa over two quarters. That alone would be worth a mention. The operators involved in several of those changes also run other nearby businesses.

One Operator, Three Addresses

As Tampa Bay Business & Wealth reported, SoHo Saloon's closing announcement said the space would become "another fresh, elevated hospitality concept," courtesy of Disser Hospitality, the group led by Michael Disser. Disser wasn't a new name on the block. His company already runs Sunset Rodeo a few doors down. And at the same time SoHo Saloon was closing, Disser had a second project moving through construction: Howard & Platt, a full-service restaurant and bar going into the long-vacant TC Choy's building at 301 S Howard Ave, a 6,325-square-foot buildout with exterior dining space, originally targeted for a May opening.

The projects put an existing restaurant, a replacement concept, and a new buildout under the same operator.

Restaurant Operators Across South Tampa

The pattern isn't limited to bars. Meeting House, the rebrand that replaced Daily Eats at 901 S Howard Ave, and the new Fresh Kitchen flagship at 1719 W Kennedy Blvd both trace back to Ciccio Restaurant Group. The Fresh Kitchen flagship isn't a brand-new bet on the neighborhood, either. It replaces the original Fresh Kitchen, which sat on South Howard Avenue until a fire destroyed it in July 2024. The new building is roughly 1.5 miles away and about double the size, built as what the company has described as a testing ground for menu and design as it expands toward fifty locations over the next decade.

These examples show that a new restaurant name or address does not always mean a new operator has entered the area. Meeting House and the Fresh Kitchen flagship are each worth a visit on their own terms.

Retail Openings in Hyde Park Village

Walk from South Howard up toward Hyde Park Village and the mix of businesses changes. Ralph Lauren reopened at 1609 W Snow Ave on July 28, taking a 2,300-square-foot space next to Buddy Brew that had sat empty for more than a year after the Wine Exchange closed. The detail that makes this more than a routine store opening: Ralph Lauren was one of the first retailers in Hyde Park Village when it opened in 1985, and closed there in the 1990s as the shopping district went through a rough patch before its later revitalization. This isn't a new tenant. It's a name returning to the same six blocks more than thirty years later.

A few months earlier, in late April, the Los Angeles denim brand Paige opened its first Florida store at 1517 W Swann Ave, between Kendra Scott and The Salty Donut, in a space that had been Mizzen+Main. Then in August, Hermès announced it had signed a lease for an 8,030-square-foot, two-story boutique in the Village, with an opening targeted for sometime in 2027.

The three retailers are national or international brands. Boston-based WS Development has owned Hyde Park Village since 2013 and controls leasing across its 270,000 square feet and six blocks. The announcements mark a mix of reopened, newly opened, and planned storefronts.

What Hasn't Moved

Not everything on this stretch of South Tampa is being reshuffled. The Hyde Park Fresh Market still runs the first Sunday of every month from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. through the Village's streets, the same as it has for years. It remains a regular monthly event alongside the business openings and changes described here.

What This Means If You Live Here

The examples above include repeat operators on South Howard and national or international brands in Hyde Park Village. For readers following local openings, identifying the operator as well as the concept can add context to an announcement.

That's a different kind of neighborhood knowledge than a list of what opened this month, and it's the kind that tends to hold up longer than any single restaurant's run.

If you're curious how any of this activity, from restaurant turnover to retail leasing, is shaping property values on the surrounding blocks of South Tampa, Vincent Zeoli knows this corridor block by block. Let's Connect.