The new Philly arena will have a new food and drink provider after years of Aramark, and that might not be a bad thing

The new South Philadelphia arena is still four years away but the people building it are already making moves that matter, and this one is going to hit close to home for anyone who has ever waited fifteen minutes in a concession line at Xfinity Mobile Arena only to end up with a warm beer and a soft pretzel that has seen better days.

The Sixers and Flyers announced that Levy Restaurants will be the food, beverage, and hospitality partner for the new arena when it opens in 2030. Levy is a Chicago-based company and if you have been to a major sporting event anywhere in this country, you have almost certainly eaten their food without knowing it.

They handle roughly half of all shared NBA and NHL arenas including Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, American Airlines Center in Dallas, the United Center in Chicago, Barclays Center in Brooklyn, Intuit Dome, and T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

They run the Kentucky Derby. They run the U.S. Open. They already handle the Prudential Center and Northwest Stadium, which are both HBSE properties, so the Sixers and Flyers ownership group is not exactly rolling the dice on an unknown quantity here.

The quotes from both sides are exactly what you would expect. Tad Brown and Dan Hilferty called Levy the premier hospitality provider in the country. Levy CEO Andy Lansing talked about Philadelphia’s DNA and called it an honor.

Everyone is thrilled. Great. Now let’s talk about Aramark.

Aramark has had Philadelphia sports in a stranglehold for years.

Citizens Bank Park, the Linc, Xfinity Mobile Arena, Subaru Park. If you went to a game in South Philly, you ate Aramark food. There was no alternative. It was just part of the deal, like traffic on Broad Street and someone yelling something unintelligible two rows behind you.

Aramark was the fabric of the Philadelphia sports eating experience, for better and often for worse. And to be fair to them, they are not going anywhere yet.

Hilferty made clear that Aramark keeps the current venues through the end of their run and that both sides are committed to delivering a quality product while Xfinity Mobile Arena is still operating. So this is not a messy breakup. It is just a clean handoff when the time comes.

The question for Levy is whether they can actually deliver something that feels different in a city that has extremely high standards for how it treats its fans. Philadelphia does not do polite golf applause for mediocre food at inflated arena prices.

If the new building opens in 2030 and the experience is genuinely better, Levy will get credit for it. If it is the same overpriced nonsense in a nicer wrapper, this city will let them know about it immediately and loudly.

Four years to figure it out. The clock is running.

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