Wayfair is bringing its home-goods showroom concept to Central Florida, announcing plans to open its tenth physical store at Marketplace at Altamonte in Altamonte Springs by 2028. The single-level store will measure 85,000 square feet, marking Orlando as what the company calls the next chapter in its retail expansion.
Liza Lefkowski, Wayfair's vice president of merchandising and stores, said reaching the company's tenth store is an exciting milestone, according to Retail Customer Experience. The company says it is integrating physical and digital shopping experiences as it learns how customers want to shop for their homes, per the same report. The Altamonte Springs location will be Wayfair's second physical store in Florida, joining a previously announced 94,000-square-foot location planned at the Galleria Fort Lauderdale, according to Bisnow.
A Roadmap That Spans the Country
Beyond its operational stores in Wilmette, Illinois; Atlanta, Georgia; and Columbus, Ohio, Wayfair's ten-store rollout also includes planned locations in Denver, Colorado; Westchester, New York; Cincinnati, Ohio; Princeton, New Jersey; and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, per Bisnow and Investing.com. Hoodline has previously covered several stops along that map, including Wayfair's first Pennsylvania store near Pittsburgh and its Denver mall makeover.
At 85,000 square feet, the Altamonte Springs store is notably smaller than Wayfair's multi-story, 150,000-square-foot Wilmette flagship and the 130,000- to 140,000-square-foot locations planned for Cincinnati and Denver, Bisnow reports, reflecting what the outlet describes as an evolving single-level footprint. Wayfair operates about ten smaller specialty stores of 8,000 to 10,000 square feet under its AllModern, Joss & Main, and Birch Lane brands, plus luxury Perigold showrooms in Houston and West Palm Beach, according to the same Bisnow report.
A Vacant Power Center Gets New Life
Marketplace at Altamonte is a 335,995-square-foot retail power center built in 1974 and located 16 miles north of Orlando. It was sold by Sagard Real Estate in January 2025 for $28.9 million to an entity affiliated with Centro Property Management LLC while just 55% occupied, according to Shopping Center Business. Existing anchor tenants at the center include Burlington, Ross Dress for Less, and Total Wine & More, the outlet notes.
Wayfair's arrival fits a pattern the company has followed elsewhere: planting single-level showrooms inside suburban power centers that are working through vacancy and re-tenanting. The Altamonte Springs deal shows how Wayfair is willing to bet on a half-century-old shopping center in the middle of a turnaround rather than wait for brand-new construction.
From Pure E-Commerce to Physical Showrooms
Wayfair, founded in 2002 by Niraj Shah and Steve Conine and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, operated strictly as an e-commerce platform for more than two decades before launching physical stores, according to WTTW. The company kicked off its large-format strategy in May 2024 with a 150,000-square-foot flagship in Wilmette, Illinois, that featured 19 product departments and an on-site restaurant called The Porch, per company announcements cited by PR Newswire.
That first store appears to be paying off. More than half of shoppers visiting the Wilmette flagship were new to the Wayfair brand, and sales growth across Illinois ran 15% higher than the national average a year after the store opened, according to data presented at eTail Palm Springs. Wayfair's physical retail bet also comes as the company's finances have stabilized: by mid-2026, the retailer reported four consecutive quarters of positive revenue growth and its strongest quarterly free cash flow since 2020, Bisnow reports.
What Comes Next for Altamonte Springs
Wayfair has not detailed a construction timeline for the Altamonte Springs project beyond the target 2028 opening, and it remains to be seen how the smaller 85,000-square-foot format will translate compared with the chain's larger flagship layouts. Whether the capital investment continues to generate the kind of regional sales lift Wayfair saw in Illinois is also an open question as the company's broader financial recovery continues.
