Panera Bread moving Dixwell Avenue plazas

Panera will relocate from its current home in Hamden Plaza, which does not have a drive-thru and is attached to other retail businesses, meeting minutes state. The fast-casual dining chain’s new location is scheduled to open in the summer of 2025, a Panera spokesperson said.

HAMDEN — Panera Bread is moving from one Dixwell Avenue shopping plaza across the street to another, officials said.

The bakery-café will open a drive-thru restaurant at a standalone building in the Marketplace at Hamden, according to an application approved by the town’s Zoning Board of Appeals in January. Pier 1 Imports, a home goods retailer, formerly occupied the space, which is 9,280 square feet.

Panera will relocate from its current home in Hamden Plaza, which does not have a drive-thru and is attached to other retail businesses, meeting minutes state. The fast-casual dining chain’s new location is scheduled to open in the summer of 2025, a Panera spokesperson said.

John Knuff, of the Milford-based Hurwitz Sagarin Slossberg & Knuff, the applicant’s attorney, told the zoning board that his client has been searching for a tenant to fill that parcel since Pier 1 departed in 2020.

“That’s one of the reasons we’re excited that the client has found this very highly sought-after tenant,” Knuff said. “It’s really going to help energize the center which is obviously very popular as it is.”

The Marketplace in Hamden also features Stop & Shop, Old Navy Petco, Pep Boys and Aspen Dental.

Panera has been expanding in the Nutmeg State. It opened a café in Stamford this week, its 33rd location in Connecticut, and plans to open another drive-thru café in Danbury in late 2024.

Facing competition from online retailers, Pier 1 Imports filed for bankruptcy in February 2020 and closed about half of its 900 locations. It since has shuttered all of its Connecticut stores.