Things to Do in Foley Alabama for Late Summer 2026

If you have lived in Foley for more than a couple of years, you have watched the town's night-out map get redrawn in slow motion. For a long time the answer to "where are we eating" was some version of Tanger, S. McKenzie, or OWA. In 2026 that answer is quietly changing, and the clearest signal is a New Orleans oyster house moving into the old Foley Bakery building on the corner of N. Alston and W. Laurel.

This post is a filter, not a firehose. Here is what has actually opened around town, what is still coming, and the late-summer and early-fall dates worth putting on the fridge, read through the lens of someone who already lives here and just wants to know where the good Thursday is.

Downtown is where the interesting openings landed

The headline is Half Shell Oyster House. Gulf Coast Restaurant Group took the historic Foley Bakery building at N. Alston Street and W. Laurel Avenue, most recently occupied by Colt Grill BBQ before that restaurant closed amid a federal investigation of its owners, and opened a New Orleans-inspired seafood house in the space. The menu leans on raw and chargrilled oysters, seafood gumbo, fried Gulf shrimp, hand-cut steaks, and signature plates like Seafood-Stuffed Portobello and Royal Redfish. Half Shell already runs six other Alabama locations, so the interesting thing isn't the concept, it's the address. This is the sort of tenant that used to go straight to Tanger or the highway. It went to Laurel Avenue.

Foley Main Street's executive director Darrelyn Dunmore called the arrival a strong fit for downtown, and the practical read for residents is simple: a proper sit-down anchor now exists inside the Third Thursday footprint, which changes what a downtown night can be.

Downtown is also where the calendar is thickening. Foley Main Street has the August Downtown Third Thursday, billed as "The Arrr-gust Adventure," set for August 20, 2026 at 5:00 p.m. at 200 W. Laurel Avenue, followed by "Walk This Way: Mixtapes & Roller Skates," an 80s-themed walking parade and block party on September 19, 2026 at 5:00 p.m. from 125 E. Laurel Avenue. Both events are inside a five-minute walk of Half Shell's front door. Two years ago that pairing did not exist.

The corridor is still doing corridor things

None of that means S. McKenzie and the Foley Beach Express have gone quiet. They have just kept doing what they do, which is absorb national chains and mid-box retail at a pace the rest of Baldwin County can't match.

A short list of what has landed or is landing in 2026:

• Cook Out, open since April 25, 2026 at 2550 S. McKenzie St., next to the car wash and Buffalo Wild Wings.
• Wingstop, which leased 1,875 square feet in Gallery 59 with plans to open later in the year.
• BJ's Wholesale Club, which is planned for a 14-acre site along the South Juniper Street Extension a block east of S. McKenzie, with construction expected to run about a year from a September or October start.
• Aura Nail Lounge, now open on Foley Beach Express with a full pedicure, manicure, and enhancement menu.
• Snug Home, a once-a-month designer furniture and decor pop-up at 11746 Foley Beach Express between Hwy 20 and Hwy 98, with inventory rotating each month.
• Evermore Permanent Jewelry, open in Tanger Outlets next to Polo Ralph Lauren, now offering ear piercing.
• Coastal Camellia, open just off Hwy 59 with what it bills as the largest formal-dress selection in South Alabama.
• Made in Colombia food truck, opening at The Farmhouse Market at 3910 S. McKenzie with empanadas, salchipapas, and burgers.
• Yawdie A Taste of Home, a Jamaican kitchen with jerk chicken egg rolls, oxtails, curry goat, and steamed and escovitch fish, with a companion Island Creamery on the way featuring grape nut, rum raisin, and coconut ice creams.

Krystal shifted a couple of blocks down S. McKenzie to 1919 S. McKenzie St., Schreiber Veterinary Hospital is coming to 311 S. McKenzie, and Bikini Blink Bakery is now open at OWA across from Murder Creek Moonshine. Superior Crab has closed, and Towne Tap at OWA has closed with something new expected to take the space.

The point isn't to memorize the list. It's that the corridor is still where convenience lives, and downtown is now where the evening lives. Those are two different jobs, and Foley has finally sorted them.

The late-summer and early-fall calendar, filtered

If you only keep four dates, keep these.

For weekly anchors, Waffles R Wild at OWA runs Game Nights on Wednesdays from 5:00 to 9:00 p.m. and Groovy Goat runs Karaoke Night on Thursdays from 6:00 to 10:00 p.m. Local & Company on the fine-dining end continues its wine-pairing dinner series through the fall, five-course menus in the private Tasting Room, reservations at 251-201-1000. The Foley Event Center at the Foley Sports Tourism Complex has tournament weekends stacked August 28-30 and September 11-13, which is worth knowing if you live anywhere near the complex and plan your Saturday errands around traffic.

The Winn-Dixie question

The grocery churn is the change residents talk about most, and it is worth its own paragraph. Winn-Dixie in Foley closed on December 31, 2025, along with the Fairhope and Mobile locations. As of this writing the replacement tenant has not been publicly confirmed. In the meantime the practical grocery gravity has shifted toward Publix and the north end of S. McKenzie, and the BJ's Wholesale Club under construction on the S. Juniper Street Extension will change that math again once it opens roughly a year from its late-2026 groundbreaking. If you own a home within a mile of the old Winn-Dixie site, this is the kind of neighborhood-scale change worth tracking, less for property values in a headline sense and more because the answer to "where do you run for milk" is genuinely in flux.

While the retail map moves, the city's own footprint is moving too. The new Public Works Campus on North Poplar Street was scheduled for a Spring 2026 completion, the old Public Works site is being refurbished to house Parks and Recreation, and a new fire station is planned for the northeast side of the city on East Pride Drive. None of that changes your Saturday, but all of it explains why the growth around you feels planned rather than improvised.

A weekend that actually uses the new map

Here is one way to spend an August Thursday that would have been impossible eighteen months ago. Park downtown around 5:00 p.m. for the Third Thursday setup on Laurel Avenue. Wander the Arrr-gust Adventure programming, then walk to Half Shell for oysters and gumbo without moving your car. If the kids are with you, cut the evening short and drive to Lake OWA for the Fountain Show on the half hour. If they aren't, stay downtown and let the block breathe. The next morning, Snug Home's monthly pop-up on Beach Express is the kind of stop that only rewards people who already know it's there.

That is the quiet argument this fall is making. Foley grew up on the highway, and the highway is still doing its job. The interesting question for residents in 2026 is what happens now that downtown has finally caught up. If you have been in your house for five years or twenty, the town you live in is not quite the one you moved into, and the changes are mostly the good kind.

If you have been thinking about what all of this means for your own place, whether that is a home you are settling into for the long run or a property you're considering selling as the map shifts, Stacy Burgos Rodgers is happy to talk it through without a pitch. Let's Connect.