Sally's Apizza Headlined Newington's Meadow Commons in 2022. Here's the Plaza It Finally Joined.

Sally's Apizza opened at 3329 Berlin Turnpike on October 28, 2026. That was almost four years after Hartford Business Journal first named it as a tenant of Meadow Commons, the 24-acre development planned next to Best Buy and Raymour & Flanagan. The November 2022 article listed five confirmed tenants: an unnamed national grocer, Sally's, Shake Shack, the cookie shop Crumbl and PJ's Coffee. It said the first store would open in late summer 2023.

Sally's is one of only three names from that list that made it onto the plaza's August 2026 leasing plan. Seven of the ten tenants on that plan were not in the original announcement. The pizzeria that headlined the project in 2022 now anchors a shopping center that was rebuilt around it over four years of substitutions. One of those swaps left a large building empty farther down the Turnpike.

The 2022 Lineup Against the One Standing Now

The delays started early. By April 2024, The Connecticut Scoop reported that 7 of the plaza's 12 retail spaces were leased. Playa Bowls and CAVA had joined the original restaurants. Shake Shack had tentatively set its opening for April 26, 2024. A year later, in April 2025, Hartford Business Journal reported that most tenants other than the grocer were expected by Labor Day. Sally's arrived about fourteen months after that Labor Day target.

The Grocery Slot Rewrote the Plaza

The biggest change happened in the anchor space. In 2024 the grocery space was leased to Amazon Fresh, with an expected opening in January 2025. According to The Connecticut Scoop, Amazon delayed the store and then canceled it, and the 43,078-square-foot space sat empty for years.

The new tenant was already on the Berlin Turnpike. Market 32, the Price Chopper-owned chain, took the space. The Hartford Courant reported a July 17, 2026 grand opening. It also reported that the Price Chopper at 2985 Berlin Turnpike would close for good at 6 p.m. the day before. The new store has a bakery, deli, fresh meat and seafood, floral and a cafe.

Market 32 replaced the Price Chopper farther down the same road, so the opening also emptied a building. The Scoop reports that the old Price Chopper building now sits empty next to the former Dick's Sporting Goods, a combined 124,000 square feet. That is nearly three times the size of the grocery space that finally filled at Meadow Commons.

The Rest of the Row Filled In Around the Pizza

Smaller swaps changed the restaurant lineup. In July 2025 The Connecticut Scoop reported that Beso Taco Bar was out and Market Place was in. Both restaurants belong to Market Hospitality Group. The same update announced Wonder as a new tenant. Market Place Kitchen & Bar opened at 3331 Berlin Turnpike in mid-November 2025, according to the Scoop's review dated November 20 of that year. It serves seafood, salad, pasta and sandwiches, and it sits in a 5,250-square-foot space the same size as Sally's.

Some of the newer tenants aren't restaurants at all. Club Pilates and 100% Chiropractic were both open at Meadow Commons by October 2025. The Newington Chamber of Commerce held a ribbon-cutting for Wonder at 3313 Berlin Turnpike on May 15, 2026. Wonder offers pickup, delivery and dine-in.

The plaza still has room. The August 2026 leasing plan shows three open spaces of 2,583, 3,296 and 3,298 square feet. Crumbl Cookies, one of the five names from 2022, does not appear on it.

Sally's, Two Weeks In

According to WTNH, Sally's held a ribbon-cutting on the afternoon of October 28 and drew a line well before opening. The first 50 people received mystery tote bags with gift cards and merchandise, and every opening-night guest got a scratch-off card that was a winner. Executive chef Bob Lunsford told WTNH:

"In New Haven, we're used to seeing the line, waiting out for two hours. We've seen people out here camping even longer, almost four hours, outside."

Here is how the restaurant runs now, based on Hartford Business Journal's opening report and Sally's own Newington page:

• Hours: 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, and until 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
• Reservations: Lunch and dinner reservations opened starting October 29.
• Seating: More than 100 seats in the dining room plus a 12-seat bar. A 30-seat patio is set to open in the spring.
• Menu: Coal-fired pizza, plus pastas, entrees and salads.
• Beyond the dining room: Takeout, catering and private events, which matters for anyone planning a holiday gathering this season.

Salvatore "Sally" Consiglio founded Sally's on New Haven's Wooster Street in 1938. Lineage Hospitality bought the business in December 2017 and opened its first new location in Stamford in 2021.

Why Newington Was Third in Hartford County

While Newington waited, Sally's opened elsewhere. It came to the Hartford area in August 2024 with a restaurant at The Borden on the Silas Deane Highway in Wethersfield. In 2025 it added a location inside Jordan's Furniture at Westfarms in Farmington. Newington became its third Hartford County location, even though it was the one announced first. WTNH counts Newington as the sixth Sally's in Connecticut, with Norwalk and South Windsor still on the way.

The Newington restaurant was tied to a plaza whose anchor tenant went unsettled until mid-2025 and whose grocery store didn't open until July 2026. The pizzeria's lease held through every change around it. It opened about three months after Market 32 finally filled the anchor slot.

On the Berlin Turnpike, one grocery move filled a 43,078-square-foot space at Meadow Commons and emptied the old Price Chopper at 2985. If you own a home near the corridor and want to know how changes like these affect what your house is worth, The Corrado Group can walk you through it. Request a complimentary home valuation, and we'll show you where your home stands as the Turnpike keeps changing.