‘It’s such a big event’: North Shore businesses excited for NFL Draft in Pittsburgh

The phone calls to the Hyatt Place hotel on the North Shore began almost as soon as the NFL announced Pittsburgh as its 2026 draft location.

Excited football fans were ready to book rooms for the three-day party.

“We’ve had to just tell everyone we are just finding out as well, but also, it’s way too far out to make any plans,” general manager Kevin Condrin said Wednesday.

Pittsburgh hotels were involved in the bid process but didn’t know for sure if the city would be selected, he said.

“The NFL was in town and was kind of looking at logistics, hotel rooms, infrastructure,” he said. “We felt good about it that we would get it.”

Every hotel room from the North Shore to Monroeville will probably be filled during the 2026 NFL Draft, Condrin said.

“It’s such a big event,” he said. “The planning for it and everything will definitely start early — especially with our location.”

Condrin said he’s heard that the footprint of the draft, itself, will be in front of Acrisure Stadium facing down North Shore Drive, which is where the Hyatt is located.

“We plan on being right in the middle of it,” he said.

The draft — typically held in the last week of April — will incorporate elements of Point State Park and Acrisure Stadium. Steelers president Art Rooney II said the draft will be held outside of the stadium on the North Shore and will spill into Downtown Pittsburgh.

Stocking up

Despite the anticipated crowds, Jim Austin, area operations manager at Southern Tier Brewery Pittsburgh, said businesses in the area have plenty of experience with their close proximity to the stadiums during sporting events and concerts.

“We’ve experienced volume here in the North Shore,” Austin said. “It’ll be fully staffed as we would normally do for a big event. We would have security on site to help just with the flow of traffic and guests.”

Bar manager Alexis Flory at Bar Louie North Shore said the bar will gradually increase its food and drink orders during weeks before the draft to be stocked by the time people arrive for the three-day event.

The bar plans on doubling its staff and hiring roughly six to seven more servers to be fully trained by the time the draft comes to Pittsburgh, she said.

Austin said Southern Tier’s general manager has connections around the city and will turn to hotels and other businesses to get an estimate on expected dining numbers.

‘We know the drill’

The Hyatt Place hasn’t opened room bookings for the draft yet, but Condrin said he expects them to open up earlier than usual. However, the hotel will wait until groups like ESPN and ABC potentially reach out for room blocks.

“This property booking window is always very small,” he said, as it’s based on sports schedules. “We aren’t even selling a single room in 2025 yet — let alone 2026.”

Condrin said the hotel prefers to host fans, so typically, it doesn’t host many groups.

“With us being so close and probably inside the security perimeter of it … we’re expecting some requests from the larger groups and production,” he said.

The Hyatt’s proximity to the draft’s festivities might make it tough logistically, Condrin said. He and the staff aren’t intimidated.

“We know the drill,” he said. “It will be interesting to see how guests come and go, staff comes and goes, but I feel confident that we’ll be pretty involved and have information very far ahead of time — especially because of our location.”

Condrin said he’s predicting that the weekend will be just as big as Taylor Swift’s concert weekend last year, if not bigger.

“The draft helps put us on the map more nationally,” he said of the North Shore. “I think it will help make this kind of a destination for people.”

Abbey Larotonda, a store manager at Rally House North Shore, said she and other workers heard the news around the same time the public heard it on Wednesday.

“I just kind of felt that it was gonna happen for our city, so it doesn’t surprise me that we got it,” she said. “It will be like a game day, in my opinion — probably times three.”

As a former football player at Slippery Rock University, Edgar Parrilla said the draft coming to Pittsburgh will give the city extra recognition.

He was “pumped” when he heard the news. He plans on attending.

“I feel like Pittsburgh doesn’t get enough credit,” said Parrilla, 25, of Mount Washington. “We do a lot of cool stuff around here.”

As a Steelers fan with season tickets, Larotonda believes that Pittsburgh hosting the draft will positively impact the community.

“I could be wrong, but it doesn’t feel like it’ll be as rowdy as a home Steelers game,” Austin said. “I think folks are going to want to come to town for it and probably follow their teams and who’s being picked.”