More regular updates can be found on Bluesky and the Message Board.
High Point History
The Triad is now two thirds complete; High Point is now online. Look for Winston-Salem in a few weeks.
The Triad
I’ve uploaded the first chunk of my much-expanded look at the North Carolina Triad. Even though the entire new photo gallery has not been added, there’s till a lot to see. The revamped Greensboro section features about three times as much information, plus additional vintage photos. It’s complete through the 1970s, and may even beat last year’s Charlotte section for sheer volume of research.
Winston-Salem and High Point are coming soon.
Safeway, Denver CO
This is just sort of a cool postcard view I found on eBay. The store in question was at Wadsworth and Jewel in Denver, and it’s still standing, although (of course) the one direction that Live Local doesn’t have is the one that matches the view in the postcard.
This sort of looks like it might have started out as a Safeway-Super S supermarket and drug store combo.
A&P, Commerce Place, Greensboro NC (1936-1973)
The A&P pictured above is probably more important to me than any other supermarket in the world.
Why? Because it was my “first”. By that, I don’t mean that it was the first supermarket I ever visited, but that it was the first old supermarket that I became obsessed with as a child. As such, this website was born at that old A&P in downtown Greensboro.
Some history:
The location at 221 Commerce Place was the site of Greensboro’s first A&P self-service supermarket. The company had operated traditional stores in the city since 1910, but on 10 March 1938, the supermarket opened in a former tobacco warehouse next door to the city’s farmers’ market. The store burned down in 1946, and was replaced with a new store which opened on 16 June 1947.
The 13,500 square foot store featured such “modern features” as a candy department, refrigerated produce section, a self-service delicatessen, and eight checkout stands. A 2500-item selection was available to the discerning housewife of 1947.
Commerce Place was A&P’s top sales unit in the Carolinas for many years, and its manager said in an interview that it wasn’t losing money even at the end. It survived as one of two downtown A&P stores in Greensboro until its closing on 17 February 1973. The other downtown location closed two years later as part of A&P’s major meltdown of 1975.
This store fascinated me as a small child. I remember it as being old and dark, with ancient refrigerator cases with rounded glass, and old fixtures and counters, many of which might well have been original. It was particularly interesting for me because my mother had, as a child, lived for several years in a long-since demolished house a few doors down with her grandmother.
My childhood love for this store (and my disappointment when it closed) led me to be interested in other old supermarkets in Greensboro and elsewhere. I started eyeing old Colonial stores and the midblock Bi-Rite in a streetcar strip near UNCG. I noticed ancient A&P survivors on trips to Atlanta and other cities. During my years in California, my obsession grew to include the Marina- and pylon-style Safeway stores, among others. The fact that so many had been demolished or (like Commerce Place, above) remodeled into such bland and uninspiring structures also made me want to preserve what images I could, because I was interested and didn’t really think anyone else was.
Thus, Groceteria.com was born as a result of an old A&P in Greensboro NC that closed when I was eight years old. And just this weekend, I finally found the vintage photos above and several newspaper articles about “my first store” and wanted to share them here.
See a large group of photos of this store at its grand opening in 1947 here at Digital Greensboro.
Do you have a “first” store that ignited your interest in old supermarkets? If so, I’ve started a thread for discussing it in the message board.
Mick-or-Mack, Roanoke VA
Apologies for the long absence. I’ve had a lot going on the past few weeks.
Submitted for your Monday morning approval: Mick-o-Mack, 1312 Winborne Street, Roanoke VA. This is about as sexy as it gets. I’ve heard a bit about this particular chain, and I’ll try to to learn more soon. I’ve decided that Roanoke will be my next featured city after I complete my new Winston-Salem section with its accompanying update and expansion of the Greensboro section.
Farewell, Cala Foods?
The photo above was emailed to be by my husband, who’s working in San Francisco this week. So it happens on Monday. After more than sixty years as one of the most recognized names in San Francisco grocery retailing, most Cala Foods and Bell Market stores will become Delano’s IGA. Sounds vaguely like the name of a feed store, doesn’t it?
When I first moved to San Francisco, Cala stores were exactly how I’d always imagined “urban” supermarkets would be: small, old, and almost comically overpriced. Despite the fact that shopping there regularly would have bankrupted me, I always liked visiting their stores. In fact, the Cala store at 1095 Hyde Street (featured earlier here and here) was the first supermarket I ever visited in California, and it remains one of my favorite stores ever.
Safeway, Kensington MD, Circa 1949
Safeway, Kensington MD, circa 1949. This store was replaced in 1964 with an arch-roofed Marina prototype store, which was demolished last year to construct a third store at the same site. Obviously, some 1940s employee of Safeway’s real estate department made a really good call on this one.
Colonial, Winston-Salem NC, 1958
Colonial Store, 514 North Cherry Street, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Open 27 October 1938. Closed 24 May 1958. Since demolished. Photo from the now-defunct Twin City Sentinel.
Originally a Big Star, this 12,000 square foot store was widely regarded as Winston-Salem’s first self-service supermarket. It came shortly after the opening of the David Pender Grocery Company’s first Big Star supermarket in downtown Greensboro, thirty miles east.
What does this all mean? Only that I’m well into my research on the upcoming Winston-Salem section of this site. Comments and submissions welcome.
Save-Mart, Sonora Ca, 1974
Still-open Save Mart store, Sonora CA. From Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974).
Atlanta, 1978
Spotlight on Atlanta, Georgia. The following logos are from the 17 August 1978 issue of the Atlanta Journal and Constitution. The newspapers combined publication that day due to a blackout downtown. The actual newspaper was only four pages, but the food sections had apparently already been printed and were included in their entirety.
The Big Apple and Food Giant chains have been discussed on the Message Board.
A&P would remain a fairly major player in Atlanta until 1999, when it sold many of its stores to Publix.
Big Star, built on the foundation of Colonial Stores, was purchased by Grand Union in 1978. The Atlanta division lasted longer than the rest of Big Star, until 1992, when most of the stores were sold to A&P. Big Star also operated the food departments of Richway discount department stores, in much the same way that Colonial had operated Kmart Food stores in some areas.
Kroger is the only one of the 1978 chains to still have operations in Atlanta.
I really don’t know anything about Thriftown and Big Buy.
And we all know about Winn-Dixie. Enough said.