LARGO — It’s the height of summer in the Sunshine State, when temperatures run high and foot traffic at many local businesses runs low. But the heat hasn’t slowed a steady stream of new businesses opening across the greater Largo area, a trend stretching back a few years and continuing with the recent debut of Horizon West Bay, the $85 million mixed-use complex downtown that houses a Strachan’s Ice Cream and a Parlor Doughnuts.
The Largo Village Shopping Center at 11900 Seminole Blvd. recently landed two tenants: the Barracuda Deli Cafe, which relocated from the Oxford Square plaza in Seminole to a spot behind the Niagara Tap, and an Advance Auto Parts, which took over the former Big Lots at the back of the plaza.
Barracuda, known for its Cuban sandwiches, made the move in April and remains as busy as ever.
Across the parking lot, the 35,000-square-foot Advance Auto Parts serves as a “market hub” — a distribution center that indirectly supplies more than 120 stores across the Tampa Bay area, said Mary Howell, the store’s general manager.
“This is the largest hub we offer,” Howell said from the front of the sprawling store, which she said will directly stock 45 nearby Advance Auto Parts locations through multiple daily deliveries.
“So you can pay at your store, and we can have the item delivered in two hours,” she said, adding that customers who don’t want to wait can pick up orders directly at the hub.
The Largo location is one of just 35 such hubs the North Carolina-based company operates nationwide. “The plan is to make sure our stores are never out of stock,” Howell said.
Coming soon
Several new businesses are in the pipeline across the greater Largo area, with some closer to opening than others.
Tavern in the Bluffs is set to open “very soon.” The upscale sports bar, in the Bluffs Plaza at the corner of West Bay Drive and Indian Rocks Road in Belleair Bluffs, is in the final stages of hiring staff and adding finishing touches to a space its owners hope will breathe new life into the plaza and the surrounding Bluffs community.
“We don’t want to give a date because we won’t open until we’re absolutely ready,” owner Constantinos Pappas said July 10 from inside the sleek new bar and eatery. His family also owns Backwaters Grill in Sand Key. “But we promise we’ll be open very soon, and we hope everyone will come check us out when we do.”
A few miles away, Tracey DeMarco, owner of Seminole Sourdough, plans to open her first brick-and-mortar shop at 12185 Indian Rocks Road in Largo later this summer.
The 2-year-old online bakery makes “one thing and one thing only,” according to its Facebook page: sourdough bread from three ingredients — flour, water and salt — sold at local markets.
DeMarco announced in May that she was converting the former Farm Stand into a drive-thru-only store, a project that has required extensive remodeling. In a recent post, she said she was awaiting a second grease trap required by the city, followed by permit approval, installation and inspection, with an eye toward an August opening.
Elsewhere, the Midas auto service center is relocating to 12477 66th St. in Largo.
The Largo Planning Board on July 2 cleared the way for a Bank of America on a lot at 5105 East Bay Drive that has housed the auto repair shop for 50 years, approving a conditional-use request by a 3-2 vote after a lengthy discussion of noise, traffic and other concerns.
Plans call for a 4,249-square-foot bank with drive-thru service and ATMs. The property now holds a 3,956-square-foot, single-story masonry building constructed as an auto service center in 1976. It has operated as one ever since, predating the Largo Tri-City Activity Center standards, which the city adopted in 2020 to restrict auto-oriented uses, officials said.
Under its agreement with Bank of America, the drive-thru must sit at the rear of the site to comply with city codes, a requirement planner Kimberly Mejia said presents a unique design challenge given the location.
The 24-hour ATMs would run along the east side of the property, behind a 30-foot landscape buffer next to the Blue Horizon mobile home park, with another along the south side. To make the layout work, the plan shifts the building toward the street — adding a single bay of parking along East Bay Drive and moving the bank nearer 69th Street — so the drive-thru ATM lanes can keep the 30-foot residential separation while leaving room for a bypass lane and adequate traffic flow.
Next, the developer will meet with residents to discuss the site plan before it advances to the full development-review process involving city, county and state officials, staff said.