The tariff environment has bifurcated the retail expansion landscape in 2026. Categories with significant import exposure — furniture, home goods, apparel, specialty gifts — are contracting or holding flat. Categories that are structurally insulated from tariffs — discount retail, grocery, fitness, fast casual — are expanding aggressively. Understanding which categories are expanding and why they are expanding in managed corridors specifically is the prerequisite for effective activation partner selection and tenant pipeline development in the current environment.

2026 Planned New Locations — Tariff-Resistant Retail Categories
Source: Company earnings reports · SEC filings · NRF 2026 Retail Outlook

Expanding Categories

Discount Retail. TJX Companies (T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, HomeGoods) is planning approximately 130 new store openings in 2026. Burlington Coat Factory is targeting 100 or more new stores. Dollar General is adding 450 or more locations. Five Below, Dollar Tree, and Big Lots (selectively, post-bankruptcy restructuring) are also active. Discount retailers are benefiting from the tariff environment in a counterintuitive way: their off-price model allows them to absorb tariff-driven merchandise cost increases more flexibly than full-price retailers, because their value proposition is not anchored to specific price points but to a comparison with full-price retail.

The discount retail category is specifically interested in former pharmacy boxes — 12,000 to 14,000 square foot corner locations that match their standard store format. District managers who have departed pharmacy boxes in their corridor geography should have discount retailers on their outreach list.

Grocery. Aldi is planning 180 or more new U.S. locations in 2026. Trader Joe's and Wegmans are continuing steady expansion. The grocery category is substantially insulated from tariff exposure because of its domestic agricultural supply chain orientation. Grocery is also the most powerful residential-serving anchor tenant in the current conversion environment — corridors that receive residential conversion populations need grocery service within walking distance.

Fitness. Planet Fitness added 181 clubs in calendar year 2025. Crunch Fitness is targeting 100 or more new locations in 2026 with explicit interest in pharmacy box locations. Orangetheory and other boutique fitness concepts are continuing expansion. Fitness is structurally insulated from tariffs — it sells access to space and instruction, not imported goods — and the category's demand has continued to grow as wellness spending has remained resilient across income cohorts.

Fast Casual Food and Beverage. Wingstop is targeting 475 or more new units. Chipotle is planning 350 to 370 new restaurants. Cava is adding 68 to 70 new Mediterranean fast casual locations. Sweetgreen, Shake Shack, and Dutch Bros are all continuing active expansion. Fast casual benefits from domestic agricultural sourcing and a service model that limits import exposure to kitchen equipment and packaging — categories where tariff impact is manageable relative to total restaurant operating costs.

Contracting Categories

Furniture retail experienced more than 10 bankruptcy filings between 2025 and early 2026. Z Gallerie (again), several regional furniture chains, and various home goods specialty retailers have filed, closed, or significantly contracted. The tariff exposure for furniture — which sources heavily from Southeast Asia and faces escalating tariffs across multiple rounds of trade action — has been compounding for six years. The category has not recovered its pre-tariff financial profile at any point since 2018.

Home goods, apparel with Asia-dependent supply chains, and specialty gift retail are in similar positions — managing margin compression and in some cases making inventory decisions based on tariff exposure rather than customer demand. These categories are not disappearing from corridor environments, but their expansion pipelines are materially thinner than the expanding categories, and their marketing budgets for corridor activation partnerships are reduced.

July 24: The Section 122 Expiration Signal

The Section 122 surcharge expires July 24, 2026 — barring extension or replacement with a new tariff mechanism. If the surcharge expires, the tariff landscape for furniture and home goods improves meaningfully: import cost pressure decreases, margin recovery begins, and expansion planning that has been deferred or canceled may restart.

For activation investors, July 24 is a signal date. If furniture retail shows signs of stabilization in H2 2026 — expansion announcements, bankruptcy filings declining, merchant credit metrics improving — that is a signal that tariff-driven retail composition pressures are easing. Categories that have been in the contracting column may begin to recover their expansion capacity. Monitor this category-level data through H2 as a leading indicator for 2027 activation planning.

What Activation Partners Are Looking For

The expanding categories — discount retail, grocery, fitness, fast casual — have active site requirements and marketing budgets. They are deploying capital to managed corridors specifically. District managers who can present a corridor with documented foot traffic, professional ambassador operations, a specific available space, and a willing landlord are presenting exactly what these expanding categories need.

The activation conversation with an expanding category is different from the activation conversation with a contracting one. An expanding discount retailer is evaluating specific site metrics — daily traffic counts, demographics, parking, co-tenancy — against a portfolio of candidate locations. The district manager's role is to make the case that the corridor clears the site requirement thresholds. The conversation can happen. The contracting furniture retailer is managing its existing footprint; the conversation about new activation commitment is not available.

Key Takeaways

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