World Cup Drove 53.7% Dining Traffic Jump Near Stadiums

Dining visits jumped 53.7% year over year within a mile of stadiums hosting World Cup matches, while retail visits rose 22%, according to a new report from Placer.ai and Colliers covering the 11 US host cities and five host cities in Canada and Mexico.

Sporting goods stores were the retail standout. Visits on match days rose across all 11 US host metro areas, averaging 14% above typical pre-tournament weekday visits.

The report singled out Adidas, Fanatics and Foot Locker, whose new and pop-up locations and activations performed especially well. Adidas ranked as the highest-performing retailer for foot traffic in June, with visits up 28% year over year.

Why didn't every nearby store win?

Other categories — apparel, superstores and QSRs — saw visit gains vary significantly by location. The report's authors argue the variance came down to execution, not geography.

"Proximity alone does not guarantee that businesses will capture it," Anjee Solanki, national director of Retail Services and Practice Groups at Colliers, said in a statement.

"The properties that performed best became part of the fan experience through the right tenant mix, gathering spaces, or activations," she said. "For landlords and retailers, the opportunity is to move beyond simply being near an event and create destinations that consumers actively choose to visit."

What was the economic payoff?

New York Governor Kathy Hochul recently announced the tournament generated a $3.5 billion economic impact for New York and New Jersey, where matches were played at MetLife Stadium. The figure, citing a report from Tourism Economics, includes:

• $1.9 billion in direct spending
• $264 million in retail
• $346 million in food and beverage, including restaurants, fast food and convenience stores
• About 4,500 food and beverage jobs supported by the World Cup

Is a slowdown coming?

The summer spending surge may have pulled demand forward. NRF Chief Economist Mark Mathews warned earlier this summer that increased spending during the World Cup and other summer events could lead to a fall slowdown.

Real estate software company MRI Software has already flagged cooling momentum: August foot traffic across US downtowns and malls fell 3.2% month over month as the boost from summer events faded.

For marketers and landlords planning around the next mega-event, the Placer.ai and Colliers findings point to a clear lesson: activations and tenant mix, not stadium adjacency, converted visitor inflows into measurable traffic.