Ivar’s breaks 7-year expansion drought with new location

Washington’s famous seafood bar, Ivar’s, has announced that its newest location in Gig Harbor will open in February 2026.

The Gig Harbor Ivar’s will be located at 4901 Point Fosdick Drive and will be the chain’s first new restaurant in seven years, according to The Puget Sound Business Journal.

“We have been looking for a spot in Gig Harbor for 15 years,” Ivar’s President Bob Donegan told The Puget Sound Business Journal. “We had looked at this location about seven years ago, but the rent was too high. They approached us again in August, but the price was still too much. Then they finally said, ‘Let’s make a deal.’ We signed the lease last month.”

Ivar’s to open newest location in Gig Harbor

The new Ivar’s seafood bar will take over a 3,692-square-foot space previously used by Lunchbox Laboratory, which became available 18 months ago.

Ivar’s will join the Point Fosdick Square shopping complex, which also houses Safeway, Kohl’s, and Michaels within its 183,000-square-foot building.

Since Ivar’s also owns Kidd Valley burgers, the new location will serve both seafood and Kidd Valley offerings, operated by a staff of approximately 12 employees.

The company reviews several aspects of a potential location before determining it is feasible for the chain, and the Gig Harbor location exceeded those needs by nearly double the square footage.

“We need at least 2,000 square feet, a freestanding or endcap location with at least 35 dedicated parking spaces,” Donegan told The Puget Sound Business Journal. “We also need 30,000 daytime residents who live within a mile of the location for our lunch services and 30,000 households within three miles.”

Ivar’s does not currently plan to add any restaurants to its roster. However, the chain continues to prospect for locations in Factoria, Newcastle, Mill Creek, Woodinville, Olympia, Lakewood, Poulsbo, and Vancouver.

“We get dozens of requests from our fans west of the (Tacoma Narrows) bridge asking us for a store near them,” Carl Taylor, director of operations for Ivar’s Seafood Bars, told the Puget Sound Business Journal in an email. “We are happy to have finally found a site in a beautiful, busy center. Hungry diners will no longer have to cross the bridge to get to fish and chips and chowder at the Ivar’s in James Center or Cheney Stadium.”

Gig Harbor’s new location will be added to the current 18 Ivar’s seafood bars, three waterfront restaurants, and several stadium concessions across T-Mobile Park, Lumen Field, Cheney Stadium, and Husky Stadium.

The last opening of an Ivar’s restaurant was in 2019, when the Kidd Valley in Kirkland converted to an Ivar’s restaurant.

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