Several restaurants have announced plans to open in Olney, and some locations were still under construction or without opening dates as of late summer 2026.
The locations below offer a snapshot of reported progress and what had opened by late August 2026.
Restaurant opening timelines
Start with the storefront generating the most foot traffic in local group chats: 18209 Village Center Drive, next to Hallmark, in the space a karate studio used to occupy. Chicken Salad Chick signed on for that address and was first reported as coming to Olney in November 2025. Co-owner Carrie Tydings originally targeted a March 2026 opening. By May, that had slipped to early July. By early August, MoCoShow reported the company's update on the buildout: "electrical and plumbing is largely done, and drywall is next," with no month attached to the opening at all. Ten months after the lease became public, the space still doesn't have a date.
The August 6 MoCoShow roundup covered the recent Olney signings. Here is the status of those locations, including Chicken Salad Chick, as of late August:
| Business | Space it's taking | Timeline so far | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chicken Salad Chick, 18209 Village Center Drive | Former karate studio | Announced Nov. 2025, targeted March, revised to July | Still under construction, drywall pending, no month announced |
| TOUS Les JOURS, 3333 Olney Sandy Spring Road | Former Five Guys (closed Dec. 7, 2025) | Permanent signage installed in summer 2026 | No opening date announced |
| Qdoba, 3486 Olney Laytonsville Road | Former Eco Cleaners | Lease signed | No opening date announced |
| Bubbakoo's Burritos, 16822 Georgia Ave | New location near Roots Market | The August MoCoShow report said it remained scheduled to open this year | Construction ongoing, no date |
| Buffalo Wild Wings GO, 3231 Spartan Rd | Former Three Points Cycles | Lease signed | No opening date announced |
| Mezeh Mediterranean Grill, 18129 Town Center Dr | Former Olney Winery | First reported Jan. 2024, opened May 2026 | Open |
Mezeh is the only location on this list that is open. It opened in May 2026, more than two years after its lease was first publicly reported. The other locations remain at different stages, and several still have no opening date.
What's actually being replaced tells you more than what's arriving
The names on the incoming side of that table are worth grouping, because they are not a random assortment of restaurants. Qdoba, Mezeh, Bubbakoo's, Chicken Salad Chick, and the takeout-and-delivery Buffalo Wild Wings GO format are all some version of the same idea: a counter, a line, a build-your-own bowl or sandwich, and an operator running multiple locations across the county or the region. Qdoba's Olney lease will make it the chain's fourth Montgomery County restaurant, joining locations on Tech Road in Silver Spring, Rollins Avenue in Rockville, and Rock Grove in Gaithersburg. Bubbakoo's first county foothold was a stall inside Market Hall at Clarksburg Premium Outlets in 2025, before Olney became its first standalone address in the county.
What they are replacing is a different category entirely. A karate studio. A dry cleaner. A bike shop. A wine shop. These were single-purpose, single-location businesses, the kind that exist to do one specific thing for the people who already live nearby. What's arriving in their place is built to be duplicated, block by block, county by county. That is not a comment on quality. It is a comment on what kind of tenant is currently willing and able to sign an Olney lease, and it is worth knowing before you assume the empty storefront you pass every day is about to become something distinctly local. The odds, based on this year's pattern, favor a familiar name from somewhere else in Montgomery County.
Two restaurants reopened after major disruptions
Set that pattern next to what happened at the two Olney restaurants that faced something closer to an actual emergency this cycle, and the contrast sharpens.
The Greene Turtle, at 18101 Town Center Drive, was struck by a vehicle late in 2025, causing damage significant enough to trigger a gas leak and a forced closure. It did not sit empty waiting for a new tenant. It reopened on March 12, 2026, under its own name, in its own space.
The Olney Ale House has existed in some form since 1924. A 2019 fire kept it closed for six years. When it came back, it came back in October 2025 following a full rebuild and renovation, not as a lease handed off to whichever chain wanted the address next.
Both of those buildings had every reason, on paper, to become the next Qdoba or Chicken Salad Chick. A gas leak and a six-year closure are the kind of disruption that ends a lease in a lot of commercial corridors. Instead, both reopened as themselves. The turnover happening in Olney right now is concentrated in the smaller, single-purpose storefronts. The sit-down anchors that survived actual disasters are proving to be the sturdier half of the local commercial map, not the more vulnerable one.
The Sunday market schedule
The Olney Farmers and Artists Market operates year-round on Sundays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 2801 Olney-Sandy Spring Road. The table lists six restaurant locations: one is open and five remain unopened.
For residents following Olney's commercial changes, the market offers a recurring Sunday activity. For the restaurant locations above, check the reported status and any announced opening date before making plans.
These reported statuses are a late-August snapshot, not a guarantee of when the remaining restaurants will open.
If you're weighing what a neighborhood like Olney means for your own next move, whether that's staying put and watching the corridor fill in, or timing a purchase or sale around what's actually open versus what's still under construction, DMV Living Group can walk through the specifics with you. Schedule your complimentary concierge consultation whenever you're ready to talk it through.
