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How mobility data revealed World Cup group stage visitation patterns and retail trends
Privacy-safe mobility data shows how World Cup group-stage matches shaped retail visits across host cities, from downtown bars to regional restaurant and travel stops.
Key takeaways
Retail impact varied by location
World Cup visitation patterns differed by city, venue proximity, retail category, and brand rather than driving uniform growth.
Bars led match-day visitation
Bars in Boston and Atlanta saw some of the strongest increases as fans gathered before and during matches.
Destination brands stood out
Brands like Buc-ee’s and In-N-Out Burger outperformed broader restaurant and convenience store trends on match days.
Visitor mix shaped demand
Some host cities attracted mostly local attendees, while others drew more out-of-town visitors, influencing where spending occurred.
Mobility data revealed actionable patterns
Mobility insights helped uncover who visited, when demand peaked, and which locations benefited most from tournament activity.
Introduction
During the group stage of the World Cup, one feel-good story rivalled the action on the field: all the fans exploring the U.S. and marveling at such delights as the ample portions (and ranch dressing!) at homestyle American chain restaurants, the size of travel plazas, and the robust selection at convenience stores – not to mention enjoying themselves so heartily they reputedly drank at least one city nearly dry.
Retail and restaurant managers, however, need more than anecdotes to understand the potential impact that a mega-event like the World Cup might have on their business and plan accordingly. Privacy-safe, aggregated, and anonymized mobility data from opted-in smartphone apps can help businesses understand when, where, and how people move. These signals can complement other data types, such as foot traffic, demographics, or sales transactions, and support more informed operations decision-making.
For quick-service restaurant (QSR) chains, convenience stores, gas stations, hotels, and other retail outlets near World Cup venues, mobility data can help reveal consumer patterns that could separate broad tournament buzz from measurable location-specific behavior and answer such practical questions as:
- Did match windows change visitation?
- Did the lift happen near the stadium or downtown?
- Where did visitors gravitate: toward bars, quick-service restaurants, convenience, gas, or local icons?
Arity’s analysts used our Road Traffic Analytics product to study behavior and patterns around the World Cup stadiums and try to answer some of these questions.
What effect did the World Cup have on retail activity in host cities?
You might think that the World Cup would uniformly increase visits to places of interest in host cities (such as bars, restaurants, gas stations, hotels, grocery stores, and more), but the data tells a more nuanced story. During the group stage, near-stadium median activity remained relatively stable, about -2% lower compared to the prior week.
Depending on the city, match start time, and retail category and brand, however, individual nights varied from about -10% to +15%.
With the help of mobility data, more specific patterns begin to emerge. Some cities, categories, and brands saw a bump, while others stayed flat.
Which retail categories and brands saw World Cup visitation lifts?
The Scots invaded the bars in Boston – not Foxborough
The Tartan Army started to party in the afternoon for the first Boston match of Scotland-Haiti on June 13, 2026. The strongest lift was centered in downtown Boston rather than in Foxborough, where Gillette Stadium is located, or in nearby municipalities. Bar stops in the city for the Thursday-Sunday period around that first Gillette Stadium match spiked 61% above the prior week, while the inner metro area saw a 20% jump. Bars 25 miles from downtown saw a much smaller 8% increase.
+51% afternoon bar visits in Boston on June 13 (Scotland-Haiti)
For a retail operations leader or QSR manager, this kind of insight can inform staffing, marketing, inventory, and local partnerships. A stadium may host the match, but the commercial impact might land somewhere else.
Atlanta bars see the biggest lift of all
Thanks to their proximity to Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta’s stadium corridor bars had a 71% increase in afternoon visits for the Spain-Saudi Arabia match on June 21, 2026, and a 152% increase the night of the Morocco-Haiti match on June 24, 2026 – the largest lift among the World Cup cities measured in this analysis.
What’s more, these spikes weren’t just isolated to evening: mobility data showed match-window bar lifts ranging from 40% to 123%.
For brands near venues that feed crowds into entertainment and shopping areas, that kind of timing detail matters. A retail operations leader planning only for the two hours before kickoff could miss a much longer opportunity.
2.5x more evening bar visits in Atlanta (Morocco-Haiti, June 24, 18:00 start)
Regional chains capture match-day visits
Buc-ee’s boost
Regional American chains became a fan-favorite breakout hit of the World Cup. One such local hero: Buc-ee’s, a regional convenience store, gas station, and QSR all rolled into one, beloved for their beaver mascot, vast expanses of clean bathrooms, endless gas pumps, and Texas-style barbecue. While Buc-ee’s isn’t next to AT&T Stadium in Dallas or NRG Stadium in Houston, they are on the way, and mobility data showed a noticeable lift on match days (+7% for Houston and +9% for Dallas), which could indicate people stopping on their way to or from games or tourists stopping by specifically for the all-American experience.
This is an example of why retailers need the right geographic context to interpret visitation patterns. A downtown bar, a stadium-adjacent restaurant, and a highway convenience store will not show up the same way in the data, even if each plays a role in the event economy.
In-N-Out Burger visitation lift
Another beloved local chain, California’s In-N-Out Burger, sparked heavier visitation on match days at SoFi Stadium. In the L.A. metro area, other restaurants were slightly down or just slightly up, while In-N-Out captured a much larger spike in visitation, anywhere from 24% – 34% depending on the match day and time.
+24% – +34% lift in visitation to In-N-Out Burger (LA inner metro area)
This contrast shows how a named destination can outperform its category. A restaurant brand might draw visitors because it is culturally recognizable, regionally specific, convenient to the travel pattern, or simply part of the visitor checklist. Mobility data cannot explain every motivation on its own, but it can reveal that the brand-name location moved when the category did not.
Did World Cup host cities draw locals or out-of-town visitors?
Which World Cup venues leaned local and which drew larger out-of-town crowds?
Mobility data can help reveal these kinds of differences in visitor makeup. This matters for retailers because travel-heavy markets or locations with a higher number of visitors who haven’t been in the area previously may see demand spread across hotels, fuel stops, convenience stores, and dining destinations, while local-heavy markets may generate more activity around neighborhood gathering places.
Hard Rock (Miami) saw more locals
Hard Rock Stadium in Miami drew the largest share of people coming 15 minutes or less from their home zip code during the group stage. About 13% of visitors came from outside the local area, while roughly half of visitors lived within a short drive of the stadium.
Arrowhead (Kansas City) was travel-heavy
Arrowhead in Kansas City saw the largest share of people traveling more than 60 minutes from their home zip code – around 40% of visitors.
Mercedes-Benz (Atlanta) had the freshest crowds
Across the group stage, about half the phones near Mercedes-Benz in Atlanta were new to the stadium corridor that week (~49% median).
What mobility data can tell retailers about the impact of mega-events
Demand is changing faster than traditional data can keep up. That’s where mobility data comes in.
Mobility data can help turn a mega-event like the World Cup into a set of place-based insights: who came, which categories lifted or stayed flat, which brand-name destinations stood out, and which time windows mattered most.
The World Cup created different patterns in retail activity across host cities. Bars ruled in Boston and Atlanta. Brand-name destinations saw lifts in Los Angeles and Texas. Miami and New York/New Jersey skewed local, while Kansas City and Seattle drew visitors from greater distances.
With mobility data complementing existing datasets such as foot traffic and transaction data, retailers can see these patterns more clearly and plan more confidently.
Methodology
Arity’s data analysts used the Road Traffic Analytics product to build these insights. The baseline was the previous week’s day and time window. A new phone or new to the area is defined as a device not seen within 10 miles of the stadium on the same weekday prior.
Legal disclaimer
Companies referenced in these marketing materials are not affiliated with, associated with, or connected to Arity in any way. Such companies were not involved in the preparation of these materials, and any references to such companies do not imply their endorsement, sponsorship, or approval of any kind.
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