Potbelly is finally coming to Georgia. The Chicago-born sandwich chain will open its first shop in the state at Peachtree Station shopping center in Chamblee on September 1, with a full grand-opening celebration planned for later that month.
The Chamblee location, at 5001 Peachtree Boulevard, will hold its official grand-opening celebration on September 19 from 10 a.m. to noon, according to WSB-TV. The celebration includes a ribbon-cutting ceremony along with games, prizes and giveaways, and the first 50 guests in line will score free Potbelly for a year. Founded in Chicago in 1977, Potbelly now runs more than 450 restaurants nationwide, serving its signature toasty sandwiches, wraps, salads, fresh-baked cookies and hand-dipped shakes.
A Vacant MOD Pizza Space Gets New Life
The Chamblee store fills a 2,000-square-foot endcap at Peachtree Station that had sat empty since MOD Pizza closed there in March 2024, according to Tomorrow's News Today - Atlanta. Peachtree Station is anchored by a Whole Foods Market, making it one of the busier retail hubs along the corridor. Potbelly's second confirmed Georgia location is set to follow in the fourth quarter of 2026 at Forsyth Town Center in Cumming, an 1,850-square-foot space also positioned next to a Whole Foods, in a center being developed by Fuqua Development along Ronald Reagan Boulevard.
Beyond those two confirmed sites, Potbelly says it plans a broader expansion across metro Atlanta and will announce additional locations and timelines as site agreements are finalized, per the same WSB-TV report. The rollout will lean on a mix of company-owned and franchised shops.
Why an Atlanta Homecoming Makes Sense
The Georgia debut carries extra weight because of who now owns Potbelly. RaceTrac, the Atlanta-based convenience store giant, announced it purchased the sandwich chain in 2025 for $566 million, a deal that closed in October of that year. RaceTrac is headquartered in Atlanta and is one of Georgia's largest privately held companies, generating nearly $20 billion in annual revenue, according to entity background reported by Forbes. That makes metro Atlanta a natural first stop for Potbelly under its new corporate parent.
The ownership change also reshuffled Potbelly's leadership. Former chief operating officer Adam Noyes was named president of the chain after the acquisition closed, while former CEO Bob Wright departed at the end of 2025, according to Restaurant Business Magazine, as Potbelly shifted from a publicly traded NASDAQ company to a private RaceTrac subsidiary.
A Bookstore Site Becomes a Test of Dual Concepts
RaceTrac is not limiting its Potbelly ambitions to standalone strip-mall units. The company plans to integrate Potbelly shops directly into select convenience store properties, including a planned joint location at 2952 Cobb Parkway in Cobb County, according to WSB-TV. That Cumberland site was purchased by RaceTrac for $12.5 million in late 2024 and was previously home to a Barnes & Noble bookstore that operated for 30 years before closing in August 2026, a closure that sparked significant local community reaction, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The property sits near Truist Park and not far from RaceTrac's own headquarters.
On the franchise side, local group KTP PB LLC has signed a multi-unit development agreement to build 15 Potbelly locations across Fulton, DeKalb, Cobb and Gwinnett counties over an eight-year timeframe, the newspaper reports. That franchisee group is led by local entrepreneurs Sameer Tharani, Soomer Punja and Zuber Khetani. Separately, Potbelly signed a 15-unit Georgia development deal back in November 2024 with West Palm Beach-based Royal Restaurant Group, committing to open three shops a year in metro Atlanta, according to Restaurant Dive. Royal Restaurant Group also runs dozens of Potbelly and Burger King locations in Florida and Ohio.
Part of a Bigger National Push
Georgia's rollout fits into Potbelly's much larger national growth plan. The chain expects to open roughly 50 new locations across the country in 2026 as part of an aggressive franchise-led campaign meant to scale the brand from about 450 stores toward a long-term goal of 2,000 locations, per CoStar. Potbelly has been leaning on a smaller 1,800-square-foot store prototype to speed up that unit growth.
The Chamblee opening also continues a pattern of Chicago-founded restaurant brands setting up shop in metro Atlanta, alongside chains like Portillo's, which has been expanding into Kennesaw, according to Tomorrow's News Today - Atlanta. Hoodline has tracked Potbelly's broader Southeast growth in its first Jacksonville shop in Deerwood Village and the chain's national franchising push in the Twin Cities, as well as RaceTrac's own corporate expansion into Columbus-area stores earlier this month.
