What's New in Paramus This Fall? Openings and What's Ahead

Paramus's malls have added several new tenants this year. A coffee counter opened where a department store anchor used to be. A Korean corn dog stand moved into the food court. The old Sears at Paramus Park South just signed a lease with an indoor adventure park. Paramus's Sunday retail rules affect which types of businesses can operate on Sundays.

Those rules provide context for the new tenant announcements, which include food, entertainment, and footwear businesses.

What Actually Landed This Season

Westfield Garden State Plaza opened its first Blue Bottle Coffee in New Jersey on September 9, tucked into space 2162 near the mall's main concourse. It's the Oakland-born chain's first foothold in the entire state, and this fall it's rolling out a limited miso caramel latte alongside its usual espresso lineup.

That opening followed a run of additions announced earlier this summer. Sweet Kitchen, a bakery that started in Montclair, took space on Level 2 near Macy's with a menu built around baklava and tiramisu. Kong Dog moved into the mall's Food Court District serving Korean-style corn dogs. Footwear brands Vivaia and Hoka both opened storefronts, and Yard House, the beer-heavy Darden Restaurants chain, is expected to join the mix sometime next year.

The bigger story is a mile away at Paramus Park South, where NRG Adventure Park just signed a lease for roughly 59,000 square feet on the upper level of the old Sears, directly above the 100,000-square-foot Stew Leonard's that replaced the department store's ground floor years ago. Once it opens in 2027, the space will hold trampolines, a ropes course, climbing walls, and a virtual reality zone. In a Daily Voice report, real estate brokerage TSCG's Jamie Sackeim, who represented the landlord in the deal, described it as "a rare space to find," a wide-open floor sitting above a grocery anchor with foot traffic already built in.

Sunday Rules and the Tenant Mix

Look at that list again. Coffee. Bakery. Corn dogs. A trampoline park. What none of them sell is clothing, furniture, or appliances, which happens to be the exact category of merchandise Bergen County bans from sale on Sundays under state law. Paramus goes further than the county baseline. The borough's own ordinance, on the books since 1968, prohibits nearly all retail activity on Sundays, carving out narrow exceptions for food, medicine, newspapers, and a handful of other necessities.

Here's roughly how that plays out for a shopper on a Sunday afternoon in town:

Several of the new tenants, including the food and entertainment businesses, sit in the table's Sunday-open categories; the footwear stores appear in its Sunday-closed category. A retail tenant in a Sunday-closed category here loses roughly a seventh of its potential operating days, every single week, for as long as the lease runs. A food or entertainment tenant doesn't.

The History and Impact of Sunday Rules

Paramus's blue law traces back to a 1704 colonial statute, later folded into New Jersey's 1798 "Act to Suppress Vice and Immorality," and Bergen County voters have chosen to keep it twice in living memory, rejecting repeal by more than 60 percent as recently as 1993. It survives here specifically because Paramus sits at the intersection of Routes 4 and 17, a corridor that reportedly carries around 138,000 vehicles a day past Paramus Park South alone, and generations of residents have treated the law as the one mechanism that keeps that traffic from running seven days a week instead of six.

That history provides context for the Sunday rules in place today. When Heidenberg Properties Group, alongside Red Starr Investments, Norse Realty Group, and DAG Paramus, paid $38 million for Paramus Park South last year, they acquired a property subject to Paramus's Sunday retail rules. The purchase and subsequent leasing activity offer examples of commercial activity under those rules.

A related legal dispute concerns American Dream, which sits on state-owned Meadowlands land and has kept over 120 retailers open on Sundays since early 2025 by arguing county blue laws don't reach state property. Paramus sued in August 2025, and Bergen County's Superior Court was still weighing motions to dismiss as of earlier this year, with no resolution reported since. Whatever the courts eventually decide, Paramus's malls continue to add tenants across several categories, including food, entertainment, and footwear.

What It Looks Like on an Actual Sunday

None of this is abstract if you're the one running errands. Right now, you can walk into Blue Bottle for a shakerato any day of the week, including Sunday, while the Hoka store two doors down stays dark until Monday. Once NRG Adventure Park opens in 2027, a birthday party there will be a legitimate Sunday option in a way that, say, a mall-wide back-to-school shopping trip still isn't.

The recent tenant announcements include food and entertainment businesses as well as footwear retailers, which have different Sunday statuses under the table. If you're planning a Sunday around Paramus Park or Garden State Plaza, the safe bet is food, coffee, and eventually the trampoline park. If you're planning to buy a coat or a couch, that trip belongs on a Monday through Saturday, the same way it has for the better part of a century here.

Future announcements will show how the tenant mix develops. Sunday retail rules are one context for understanding the mix of businesses in Paramus's malls.

Paramus keeps changing in small, specific ways that reward paying attention, and that's the kind of local detail Giannisi Homes tracks across every town in this corridor, not just the ones with a listing in play. If you're weighing a move to Paramus or just want a second set of eyes on what a neighborhood is actually like to live in day to day, reach out to Eleana Giannisi for a conversation. No trampoline park required.

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.