Crain's Chicago Business

The Chicago Bears are moving forward with plans to build a new stadium on the former site of the Arlington Park racetrack in Arlington Heights. President Kevin Warren said during a news conference today that the team has been meeting with leaders of the northwest suburban village weekly and hope to move forward this year, ABC7 News reports. He said the team believes Arlington Heights is the only location in Cook County that could accommodate the team's design plan, which includes a fixed roof, the TV station reported. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/grMd4B6z

A craft beer maker in St. Charles, 93 Octane Brewery, is opening a much larger location in Elmhurst and eyeing a broader expansion. 93 Octane is operated by Pride Stores, a St. Charles-based chain of gas station convenience stores. It opened its first taproom in 2019, a 20-seat bar attached to a Pride store selling BP fuel in St. Charles. Last spring, 93 Octane opened a production facility and expanded its taproom to try to accommodate growth. But it has outgrown its space once again. The brewery needed more space to produce beer for distribution and for its taprooms, said Mario Spina, CEO and owner of Pride Stores' parent, Parent Petroleum. “Let’s find a place we can really showcase our beer.” The brewery found that in Elmhurst. The new location, set to open in about a month, seats 400 people inside and out. The 200-seat patio also has room for live music and games. There’s a full bar upstairs, with room for private parties. There’s also a full kitchen, and besides beer, there will be cocktails, sodas with housemade syrups, wagyu burgers, Friday fish fries, and more. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gHMPTdbH

Chicago State University, which is now set back from its neighborhood by broad lawns along 95th Street, is offering up some of that green space to developers who would create a college town feeling, with apartments, shops and restaurants. The state-funded institution in Roseland, almost 160 years old, in late July issued a request for proposals to build the first phase of what it calls University Village 95, which would have up to 528 student beds — all rental — and 25,000 square feet of retail space. A rendering of the complete buildout shows the south side of 95th Street lined with three- to five-story buildings from Cottage Grove Avenue nearly half a mile west to Dr. Martin Luther King Drive, in front of the existing CSU buildings. In the rendering, the cluster of green-roofed buildings is University Village 95, with CSU's existing buildings in the rear. It's "a new front door to our campus," CSU's president, Zaldwaynaka "Z" Scott, said in published materials about the plan. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gnHTPzJk

No matter what form the region's much-anticipated mass transit fix takes, bus and train fares are likely to go up. The only real questions are when and how much. The Regional Transportation Authority has told budget planners for Metra, the Chicago Transit Authority and Pace to start coming up with a Plan A and Plan B for dealing with a $771 million shortfall when pandemic-era federal funding runs out next year. One scenario assumes state legislators will come up with funding later this year; the other assumes there is no new money. Budgets are due in early October. Either way, the RTA says there needs to be at least $50 million more in fare revenue — or nearly 10% of the total fares collected last year by the three transit agencies. There was a lot of discussion in Springfield about possible funding sources before the legislative session ended May 31, but there wasn’t much talk about farebox increases, which are among the most controversial topics for transit agencies. “We’ve been clear that a fare increase needs to be part of the mix,” says Rob Nash, the RTA’s director of government affairs. “We’re building our financial plan assuming there will be an increase in fares. Our perspective is 10% is a reasonable approach.” Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gyxMS_KZ

Last week was rough on the downtown condo market, with nine different examples popping up to show that the price declines of the fraught early 2020s aren't over. Several condos sold for prices below what they went for 15 years ago or longer. Sellers on a high floor in a showcase tower put their condo on the market at $1.2 million below what they paid for it in 2022. And one North Michigan Avenue's million-dollar sale price was below what it went for in 2019, 2011 and 2009. The price struggle of the downtown condo market has been a hallmark of the 2020s, with the COVID-19 pandemic, crime and a slow return to working in offices conspiring to dim the luster of a real estate sector that was once the among the city's shiniest. "Remember those days when people were buying downtown because it was a prime, luxurious market?" said Chezi Rafaeli, a Coldwell Banker agent whose work is primarily in the downtown neighborhoods. "They don't see it that way now," he said. "They see it in Lincoln Park, in Lakeview, in Glencoe," all markets that are humming along, "but not downtown." Read more here: https://lnkd.in/g3fyQu9U

Recovering foot traffic, a string of recent deals, and vacancy falling for the first time in years are bringing some optimism to the Magnificent Mile as landlords and tenants adapt to a new retail landscape. The vacancy rate on Chicago’s best-known shopping strip was 29.3% as of July. That's down from almost 34% in 2023, according to data from Chicago-based retail brokerage Kirsch Agency, with 2024 marking the avenue's first year-over-year drop in vacancy in about a decade. In the last year, the strip has seen deals from new tenants Harry Potter Shop Chicago and Mango as well as returning retailer Uniqlo. Since 2020, the North Michigan Avenue corridor from the Chicago River to Oak Street has grappled with the COVID-19 pandemic’s blow to foot traffic as well as real and perceived problems with crime. “There’s been more activity in the last two years than there has been in the previous five or six, or even pre-pandemic, so things are definitely turning up,” CBRE broker Luke Molloy said. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gGht4q5V

The pandemic shook the restaurant industry like an earthquake. State and city policies forced the closure of dining rooms throughout the Chicago area for the better part of a year, snatching away restaurants’ main revenue stream. The closures were vast and sweeping, leaving vacant storefronts in every neighborhood. But then came the tsunami, inflation, triggered largely by supply chain issues, wiping out restaurants that the pandemic had left on shaky ground. For many survivors, the floodwaters have yet to recede, as various federal and local policies pile up and spill onto customers’ plates. New ordinances have required Chicago restaurants to give workers paid time off and higher hourly wages. Cook County property taxes have risen, and rents alongside them. Add in broad economic factors, and Chicago restaurants’ labor and product costs have increased more than 35% since 2020, according to the Illinois Restaurant Association. Fixed costs, including property taxes, insurance and rent, are up 18%. The industry has long been known for razor-thin profit margins. They’ve gotten thinner. “‘Razor’ feels thick-cut now,” says Michelle Durpetti, third-generation owner of Gene & Georgetti, an Italian steakhouse in River North. In short, Chicago restaurants are near a breaking point. We hear their stories in this month’s Crain’s Forum. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ghT8G8Rf

Brunch can be competitive, overpriced and crowded. But not at Lula Cafe. An early pioneer in Chicago's farm-to-table movement, the award-winning Logan Square restaurant is well-known for its rotating dinner menu. But for Crain’s Recommender-in-Chief David Manilow, Lula’s breakfast is the star. The 26-year-old restaurant serves a thoughtful breakfast menu six days a week featuring creative dishes like smoked trout scramble and charred scallion biscuits with mushroom gravy. Beyond the food, diners feel welcome. Locals and tourists sit side-by-side, and staffers are friendly. Read more: https://lnkd.in/gretf5ww

A Chicago restaurant owner who grew up working in his family’s Greektown restaurant wants to breathe life into the neighborhood’s Greek-run dining scene, with a new spot set to open later this summer. Ithaki Estiatorio, named for one of Greece’s islands, will have a wood-burning oven and grill and seat 180 people. It will feature Greek spirits and wine, and fly fish in from the Mediterranean. “What we’re trying to do with Ithaki is modernize a little bit of what Greek cuisine is,” said Kosti Demos, founder and partner of Ithaki’s parent company, Forte Hospitality. “We’ve been stuck in the nostalgic version of Greek food for years in the states.” The 5,500-square-foot restaurant is aiming to flip a years-old script for Greektown. The neighborhood — which stretches four blocks from Van Buren to Madison on South Halsted Street — has steadily lost Greek-owned restaurants over the past decade. Rampant development of the nearby Fulton Market District has poured in, raising property values, bringing hot restaurant competition and transforming the neighborhood that invented flaming saganaki. Costa’s, the restaurant Demos’ family once operated at 340 S. Halsted, burned down in 2010. A residential building now stands in its place. Pegasus Restaurant & Taverna, which closed in 2019 after 27 years, was also replaced with a luxury apartment building. So was Santorini, a restaurant that operated for 31 years at Halsted and Adams Street but never reopened after COVID shutdowns. The Pan Hellenic Pastry Shop shuttered in 2017. A cannabis dispensary replaced Roditys, a restaurant that once stood at 222 S. Halsted. The list goes on. Read more: https://lnkd.in/gXxznRp8

Chicago’s most notorious liquor is embracing its reputation for being nearly undrinkable. In new ads by Quality Meats, Jeppson's Malört — the bitter, wormwood-based liquor long considered a rite of passage in Midwestern bars — is inviting drinkers to describe its taste in the most grotesque terms possible. It will then turn some of those descriptions into limited-edition labels. The campaign, titled “Malört Tastes Like,” launched this week as the brand looks to build recognition and expand beyond its Chicago roots. Users are invited to visit malort.com/tasteslike to submit their own flavor analogies, with the promise that 15 finalists will be selected for public voting. The top three vote-getters will receive the ultimate dubious honor: their description printed on actual bottles of Malört. “We wanted to embrace the instinctual reaction everyone has when they taste a spirit as distinct as Malört, which is to describe it in the most foul, visceral way possible,” said Jamie Stark, group creative director at Quality Meats. “It’s human nature to want to experience it yourself—even if it’s called Jeppson’s ‘Chewed-Up Aspirin From an Unwashed Butt.’” Read more: https://lnkd.in/gRVYbvam