Daly City, CA: Alec Membership Shopping Center

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TheStranger
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Daly City, CA: Alec Membership Shopping Center

Post by TheStranger »

According to the May 1961 edition of Chain Store Age (page E98), the "Alec Membership Shopping Center" was to be built at Junipero Serra Boulevard near Eastmoor Avenue, with a 100K square foot discount department store proposed.

In that area, next to Serra Bowl (closer to Junipero Serra and D Street) towards Hill Street is the "Alec Garden Center" which has been there for years, and may still be there today. Not sure the discount store ever came to fruition, but the name makes me wonder what the deal with Alec was, and whatever happened to that company.
Chris Sampang
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Post by runchadrun »

I just came across this while looking up about Daylin in another post.

Daylin Inc of Beverly Hills bought the five-store Alec chain for stock in May, 1971. Daylin filed for bankruptcy in 1975 and sold off or closed a lot of their stores, so that may have been Alec's fate.
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Post by justin karimzad »

The Daly City Alec's did open. Alec's was like a White Front or a Gemco, and I think they had grocery departments. In fact, this Alec's became a Gemco, and later one of the first Pak N' Sav's in the bay area (per an earlier post), before Pak N' Save moved to its current South San Francisco location, and the old Alec's was demolished for BART.
There was an Alec's somewhere on Grimmer blvd. in Fremont, though I misplaced the address. It later became a sporting goods store, but when I went there last summer, the place was barracaded like a fort, and it looked like there was contstruction going on in the parking lot. The place was still there though, including the sign. I don't know what the situation was.
The other former Alec's that I know of is the current Safeway at 525 El Camino Real in Menlo Park. The exterior and basement parking garage are original. For a while, Safeway and Payless Drug shared the space. Safeway renovated their half completely, while Payless kept the original ceiling inside. When Rite Aid left, Safeway knocked out the wall seperating the two stores, and reused Payless' pharmacy. The original ceiling is still present in that space. Now, the entrance to that half of the building says "Safeway Drug". This building going to be demolished and rebuilt in stages, but I haven't been there for a year, so I don't know what the status is;
http://www.almanacnews.com/morgue/2005/ ... eway.shtml For once, Safeway is demolishing a store because it's too BIG.
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TheStranger
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Post by TheStranger »

justin karimzad wrote:The Daly City Alec's did open. Alec's was like a White Front or a Gemco, and I think they had grocery departments. In fact, this Alec's became a Gemco, and later one of the first Pak N' Sav's in the bay area (per an earlier post), before Pak N' Save moved to its current South San Francisco location, and the old Alec's was demolished for BART.
Was this a Gemco at the same time as the Serra Center store in Colma just a mile down the street? That one was one of the Gemco locations sold to Target (and operates as Target Greatland today).
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Post by justin karimzad »

TheStranger wrote:Was this a Gemco at the same time as the Serra Center store in Colma just a mile down the street? That one was one of the Gemco locations sold to Target (and operates as Target Greatland today).
I don't know; I only heard about it through word of mouth.
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Post by robsster »

The Alec store on Hill St. in Colma was never a Gemco. Alec closed in the mid 70's and was vacant for several years before Pak N Save opened.
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