This is a list of all known chain grocery addresses in Seattle from 1925 to 1986, compiled from city directories, newspapers, telephone books, and other sources. It is generated through a live Google Spreadsheet so it reflects the latest information I have.
View and download a copy of this location spreadsheet via Google Sheets.
Notes:
- Missing data for Tradewell (1957), A&P (1965)
- Piggly Wiggly Seattle and MacMarr merged in 1929 and then were merged into Safeway/Pay’n Takit in 1933.
- Lucky Stores entered the area with the purchase of Big Bear stores in the late 1950s and then grew with the acquisition of Foodland in 1963. Lucky Stores operated under the Big Bear, Lucky Foodland, and Lucky Stores banners (sometimes simultaneously) and were listed several different ways (e.g. Lucky Markets, Lucky Food Market). Lucky left the Seattle area in approximately 1984.
- See offiste links below for more.
Offsite Links:
- It doesn’t really get much better than Rob Ketcherside’s writings about Seattle history in general and Seattle grocery history in particular:
- Ba-kground: Grocery Archives
- The grocery revolution reaches Broadway
- Ice cream, beer, and the Montlake Drive-In Public Market
- Piggly Wiggly on Broadway
- Broadway Market v1.0, created by a developer, a lawyer, and a saloon owner
- Capitol Hill — Fancy groceries since 1912
- There’s really too much. Just Google “Rob Ketcherside grocery Seattle” and go from there
- Retailing in Washington
- Unreliable Safeway and Thriftway memories prove you don’t always get what you wish for!
- Seattle history: Looking back at Northgate Mall, the nation’s first shopping mall, mostly
- Seattle Municipal Archives: Street Directional Designations
Store tags:
- A&P
- Albertsons
- Big Bear
- Food Giant
- Foodland
- IGA
- Lucky Stores
- MacMarr
- Mayfair Markets
- Piggly Wiggly
- QFC
- Safeway/Pay’n Takit
- Thriftway
- Tradewell