Safeway's Florida Experiment: Save and Pack

     Since Safeway is now a part of Albertsons, I thought this post would be an interesting little piece of obscure Florida supermarket history to do a post about. For the longest time I thought Safeway was the only major supermarket chain who was able to resist the Florida temptation. However, according to some recent comments over on The Safeway and Albertsons in Texas blog, it turns out I was wrong. Safeway did have a small Florida operation back in the late 80's and early 90's called Save and Pack. Save and Pack was supposed to be a branch of the current Northern California Safeway division called Pak n' Save, a price impact, somewhat warehouse style chain similar to a hybrid of Aldi and Sam's Club. The Florida stores were also supposed to used the name Pak n' Save as well, however, due to a copyright dispute from now-defunct Jacksonville based supermarket Pic N' Save, Safeway was forced to flip their name to Save and Pack for their Florida operations. The Florida Save and Pack stores were more similar to that of a Sam's Club, but without the membership fee. While offering a large selection of discounted foods, Safeway wanted to focus more on non-food items at their Save and Pack stores due to how far away this division would be from Safeway's distribution centers in the west and northeast. The first Save and Pack store opened in Jacksonville in 1984, but most information from there gets fuzzy. What I do know is there were 9 Save and Pack stores in total, 8 in Florida and one in Alabama (locations are listed in the table below). However, when all of these stores closed and what happened in between is a bit of a mystery. I found out that two stores were closed in 1987 due to unprofitablilty (Casselberry and Pensacola), however I think the remaining stores made it into the early 90's. Kash N Karry bought the three Tampa Bay area Save and Pack stores in 1992, along with the name, which is when I believe Safeway finally left the state, however I don't know for sure if the other stores made it that far. Kash N Karry did continue to use the Save and Pack name for their own warehouse style stores throughout the state until those were finally discontinued in the late 90's, although those don't count as Safeway locations since they were opened and operated by Kash N Karry. Anyway, here is the location table and a short history of each location, similar to how my Albertsons table is set up:
   

Store Name	Store Number	Address	Shopping Center	City	State	ZIP	County	Info
Save and Pack	3201	2525 N. Dale Mabry Highway		Tampa	FL	33607	Hillsborough	A former Gold Triangle store. Save and Pack moved in here in 1985, and this location was sold to Kash N Karry in 1992, where it continued to operate under the Save and Pack name for a few years after the sale. Building was later torn down for a Sweetbay Supermarket (Now Winn-Dixie) in the early 2000's.
Save and Pack	3202	204 E State Road 436	Oxford Square	Casselberry	FL	32707	Seminole	Opened March 1986 as the 7th Save n' Pack store in Florida and the only one in the Orlando area. Closed March 22, 1987 due to unprofitability before the closure of the rest of the division. After Save and Pack closed this location became Builder's Square #1526, which closed with the rest of the chain in 1999. Currently an Old Time Pottery store.
Save and Pack	3205	5301 Norwood Ave	Norwood Plaza	Jacksonville	FL	32208	Duval	Opened 1985/1986ish in a former Woolco store. Exact closing unknown. Currently the Norwood Flea Market.
Save and Pack	3206	4335 W Fairfield Dr	Fairfield Crossings	Pensacola	FL	32505	Escambia	Opened 1985. Closed March 1987 before the rest of the division. Entire shopping center later torn down for a Lowe's and other smaller stores in the early 2000's.
Save and Pack	3207	30535 US Highway 19 N	Seabreeze Plaza Shopping Center	Palm Harbor	FL	34684	Pinellas	Opened 1985. Sold to Kash N Karry in 1992, where it continued to operate under the Save and Pack name for a few years after the sale. The building later became home to a Waccamaw Home Furnishings store, which closed with the rest of the company in June 2001. Building torn down for a new Publix, which opened in September 2003.
Save and Pack	3208	11612 N Nebraska Ave	Save & Pack Shopping Center	Tampa	FL	33612	Hillsborough	Opened 1986. Sold to Kash N Karry in 1992, where it continued to operate under the Save and Pack name for a few years after the sale. Currently a Flea Market.
Save and Pack	32XX	9400 Atlantic Boulevard	Regency Park Shopping Center	Jacksonville	FL	32225	Duval	What I believe was the first Save N Pack store to open in Florida and Safeway's first store of any kind in Florida, which opened in 1984. Later became a Kroger Welcome Warehouse style store after. Currently divided between Hobby Lobby (previously Rhodes Furniture) and Books a Million.
Save and Pack	32XX	8102 Blanding Boulevaed	Crossroads Square	Jacksonville	FL	32244	Duval	Opened 1985. Later became a Kroger Welcome Warehouse style store, then Food World, then Publix. Currently a Floor and Décor store.
Save and Pack	32XX	3725 Airport Boulevard	Mobile Festival Center	Mobile	AL	36608	Mobile	Opened 1986. Became a Kroger Welcome Warehouse style store after, which closed in the 90's. Now Academy Sports.

     Information on these stores was pretty scarce, so if you have any corrections or additions to add in about any of the stores in the table above, please let me know! I'm pretty sure there were only 9 stores, but you never know, there could have been another one floating around out there somewhere that escaped my radar.

     And in other news, I have three more Albertsons posts in the works to go up (if all goes as planned) by early June - Two short ones, or "Quick Glimpse" posts as I call them, and one regular store post, which we haven't had in a while. So stay tuned, more to come soon!

Until next time,

The Albertsons Florida Blogger