Bite-sized restaurants
Restaurant owners are rethinking their real estate amid customer changes — and rising costs
The following article appeared in the March 11, 2026, edition of The Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter with smart and original local news for Charlotte. We offer free and paid subscription plans. More info here.
Delivery apps and a preference for efficiency are reshaping Charlotte restaurant real estate; ‘it definitely has shifted to convenience’
by Daniel Larlham Jr.
The new Amelie’s in Plaza Midwood is quite a departure from the large hangout spots for which the French bakery and cafe has become known across Charlotte.
While it maintains its funky French pastiche interiors, the space is significantly smaller — and has no seating.
Justy Martinez, chief operating officer at Amelie’s French Bakery and Cafe, said that’s intentional, to cater to the in-and-out pedestrian traffic common for the neighborhood. It also just makes business sense.
“As we thought about putting another bakery in Charlotte, it just didn’t seem cost-effective to put another huge bakery [in Charlotte],” she said. “We thought to test this little concept out, that could be a satellite of a bigger bakery, so we could go into neighborhoods or little pockets of cities or Charlotte, that we currently aren’t in. And we love Plaza Midwood, so they’re going to kind of tell us what they want as a neighborhood.”