"I think every Asian kid and Chinese kid growing up, they know or their family has their own version of the tomato eggs," Andy Yang told the Jacksonville Daily Record this month. Tomato eggs, a sweet and slightly tangy scramble, are on the menu at Wokhey Wok Fired Mini Bowls. Yang soft-opened the restaurant on Sept. 16 at 8221 Southside Blvd., Unit 11, near the Baymeadows Road intersection.
If the name sounds familiar, there's a reason. Yang and his wife, Stefani Go, also own the Tous les Jours bakery a short drive away in Baymeadows Village. Before either of those, they opened two concepts north of Butler Boulevard. National brands are arriving on Baymeadows Road this year too, and an old office campus west of I-95 is making way for warehouses. Still, the operator with the most new openings around this intersection is a Jacksonville couple. They've added four concepts in about 18 months.
Four Concepts, Three Addresses
Here is the cluster as it stands in October 2026:
| Concept | Address | Opened | Previous tenant |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bibimbox Korean Kitchen & Wings | 4463 Deerwood Lake Pkwy., across from Tinseltown | 2025 | Not reported |
| Kumo Kumo Dessert Cafe | Shares the Bibimbox space | 2025 | Not reported |
| Tous les Jours | 9810 Baymeadows Rd., Unit 6, Baymeadows Village | Soft opening planned May 21, 2026 | Panera Bread |
| Wokhey Wok Fired Mini Bowls | 8221 Southside Blvd., Unit 11 | Soft-opened Sept. 16, 2026 | Tropical Smoothie Cafe |
The Florida Times-Union reported that the bakery planned a May 21 soft opening and a May 22 grand opening. The chain's store locator now lists the Baymeadows Road cafe with daily hours.
Panera didn't leave the area when Tous les Jours took its old space. It moved to a stand-alone building at 9485 Baymeadows Road. So the bakery-cafe count on this stretch went up by one.
Two Very Different Bets on the Same Corner
The couple financed and built their two Baymeadows-area businesses in very different ways.
Tous les Jours is a franchise. According to the Jacksonville Daily Record, the brand is owned by CJ Foodville, part of South Korea's CJ Group, and has its U.S. headquarters in Los Angeles. The couple had been fans from visits to larger cities and started asking about a franchise in 2024. Two weeks after a phone interview with the company, a text message told them they'd been approved. The Daily Record cited a franchise industry group's figures for what that path costs:
- $40,000 initial franchise fee covering the first 10 years
- 5% royalty on gross sales, plus a 2% advertising fee
- Total initial investment of $718,230 to $938,894
Go told the paper that the couple owns and runs the store, financed mostly by family investors. The cafe takes up 4,360 square feet.
Wokhey is the couple's own concept, and it's much smaller. Yang said it cost about $300,000 to get the restaurant ready, remodeling included. The room is about 1,800 square feet, with seven booths and two tables. That's well under half the bakery's footprint, and the build-out cost less than half of even the low end of the franchise investment range.
Yang gave the Daily Record three reasons for the location. It's close to a busy intersection. It's near college students, since Florida State College at Jacksonville's Deerwood campus is nearby. And it's convenient for him. "It's also out of convenience for myself, because I have to run between the bakery and this location," he said.
The Daily Record places both Wokhey and Tous les Jours near the same Southside and Baymeadows intersection.
What Wokhey Actually Serves
Yang grew up working in his parents' Chinese takeout restaurant in Jacksonville. He has said the food his family ate at home was different from what they served customers. Wokhey puts both on the same steam line. He studied electrical engineering and computer science and worked at Apple for a couple of years before coming home to open restaurants. He is 28.
It works like a canteen. You grab a tray, choose your dishes, and eat in or take it to go. Per the menu on the restaurant's Facebook page, as reported by the Daily Record:
- Mini bowls: 12 ounces, $4.99 to $7.99 each
- By the pound: mix and match for $10.99 a pound
- Bases: rice and chow mein, $1.99 to $2.99
- Homestyle dishes: tomato eggs, red braised pork, sweet and sour ribs, garlic green beans
- Familiar favorites: orange chicken, kung pao chicken, Mongolian beef, Thai red curry chicken, eggplant with garlic sauce
- Extras: spring rolls, crab rangoon, desserts, drinks, and a combo deal
The chef, Xiao Shulin, has a background in Chinese fine dining, according to a news release from the restaurant. The same release describes the room as "inspired by a 1970s 1980s Hong Kong aesthetic with neon red and green lights lighting up the city." Hours are 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily for now. Yang said they could change.
The National Names Arrived the Same Year
The couple's expansion overlapped with a run of chain openings within a mile or two of the same intersection.
Potbelly Sandwich Works opened its first Jacksonville shop in May 2026 at 9908 Old Baymeadows Road in Deerwood Village, in a former Subway space. The Jacksonville Daily Record reported that franchisee Patrick Prendergast's Gold & Green Management runs both Jacksonville Potbellys. The company had announced his plan for seven shops across Duval and St. Johns counties.
CAVA opened its fifth Jacksonville restaurant on Aug. 24 at 9303 Baymeadows Road, Suite 101, in Baymeadows Park, the Times-Union reported.
Closings came along with the openings. On the west end of the road, Jacksonville's last Hooters, at San Jose Boulevard and Baymeadows Road, closed permanently, Jacksonville Today reported on Oct. 4. The exact closing date isn't known. A public health and safety notice posted on the building was dated Sept. 29.
Next to the chains, the Yang and Go openings stand out because all of them answer to the same two owners, who live here and work between the stores.
West of I-95, an Office Campus Becomes Warehouses
Foundry Commercial is redeveloping 8000 Baymeadows Way, an almost 27-acre site west of I-95 and north of Baymeadows Road in the Deerwood Center office park.
The 43-year-old former AT&T American Transtech building, a three-story office building of about 456,000 square feet, received a demolition permit on June 4. A site-clearing permit followed on July 16. Foundry bought the land and building on March 26 for $18 million. On Aug. 28 and Sept. 2, the city issued permits for two speculative shell warehouses under the name Baymeadows Gateway 95.
| Before | Planned | |
|---|---|---|
| Use | Office | Industrial warehouse |
| Buildings | One, three stories | Two: Building 100 and Building 200 |
| Square feet | About 456,000 | 403,936 combined |
| Ready | Built about 43 years ago | Third quarter of 2027, for tenant build-out |
Foundry calls it the company's first office-to-industrial redevelopment in Jacksonville and its 11th nationwide. Foundry partner Mark Scott told the Daily Record that the company is targeting tenants needing 20,000 square feet or more. Counting the land purchase, the total investment is about $42.9 million.
Closer to the restaurant cluster, Savannah-based Parker's Kitchen bought the former Tux Car Wash at 8771 Baymeadows Road for $4 million on June 9. The Daily Record reported that the combined car wash and former KFC site at 8761–8771 is slated for a 5,204-square-foot store with 10 pumps and 20 fueling positions. No opening date has been announced. The chain describes itself as 50 years old, with at least 109 stores in Georgia and South Carolina.
Oct. 16 at Wokhey
Wokhey's grand opening ceremony, with raffles, is scheduled for Friday, Oct. 16. Yang says that's also when the dim sum menu comes out in full. "We'll release the dim sum part of the menu in full force," he told the Daily Record. More menu items are on the way after that, including an expanded dim sum selection.
New businesses opening, closing, and moving in near your street can change how buyers see your home. If you own near Southside and Baymeadows and want to know where your home stands as the corridor changes, The Newcomer Group can walk you through it with real numbers. Request a free market valuation to get started.
