New tenants announced for Westdale project, including new chicken wing restaurant

The developer of a 12,500-square-foot retail center on the Edgewood Road SW side of the $90 million Westdale redevelopment has announced two tenants.

Wingstop, a Dallas-based chain of more than 1,000 nostalgic, aviation-themed restaurants where the focus is on chicken wings, and AT&T/Spring Mobile, a cellular phone retailer, have signed leases with Edgewood Partners LLC.

The 1,700-square-foot Cedar Rapids Wingstop, which is expected to open in late September and employ about 30 people, will be the fast-growing chain's first location in Iowa.

'Our store number will be 1,067,” said Brent Joens, who owns a Wingstop franchise with his brother, Justin Joens. 'After the company had its initial public offering several weeks ago, it had over 260 requests for franchise information.

'Wingstop is looking to get to 2,500 restaurants, and it seems like that's a reasonable goal.”

Joens, a Cedar Rapids native, became familiar with Wingstop while living in Texas for the Past 14 years.

'When I met the Wingstop franchisee who operated the stores where I was living, he just ranted and raved about the company,” Joens said. 'My brother, Justin, and I spent a couple of days at Wingstop's corporate headquarters and fell in love with the company's ideas and goals.”

Joens said the decision to lease space at Westdale was based on dining population and travel pattern research.

'With Applebee's, IHOP, Panera Bread, Texas Roadhouse and Wendy's across the street, we felt it will be a destination spot for people to eat,” Joens said.

Salt Lake City-based AT&T/Spring Mobile, a subsidiary of retailer GameStop, operates 450 stores in 30 states, including seven locations in Iowa. The company employs more than 1,500 people.

Dave Drown of Edgewood Partners said leasing activity has been very strong.

'We have two leases executed and four more deals in the works that would complete the leasing of the building,” Drown said. 'Five of these retailers are new to the west side.

'We are in the design and pre-leasing stage of a second building. We are pleased to be a part of Westdale.”