Sunday, March 7, 2021

Former Albertsons #4484 - Palmetto, FL


Albertsons #4484 / Publix #1342
1101 8th Avenue West, Palmetto, FL

     I've done so many posts about Publixsons stores that I'm starting to run out of creative ways to introduce these as our subject of the day. It doesn't help that I still have many more Publixsons store tours in my archives too, but hopefully by the next one, I'll overcome my bout of writer's block and an introduction will spill right out of me. However, for now, I have nothing. So while a froofy intro just isn't in me this time around, that doesn't mean this store is any less interesting. The store we'll be seeing today is one of the most modern examples of a Publixsons out there, this store opening as an Albertsons shortly before the chain's great Floridian decline began to set in.


     For those of you who are unfamiliar with the area, Palmetto is a small town located just north of Bradenton, and marks the beginning of the area traditionally referred to as Southwest Florida. Due to the quiet nature of the area, Palmetto, as well as surrounding towns like Ellenton and Parrish, have seen a rise in population from those looking to leave the hustle and bustle of nearby Tampa and St. Petersburg for a calmer way of life. While continuing to this day, a lot of this population boom began in the early 2000's, a boom that Albertsons caught on to. Albertsons purchased land for two new stores in this area to take advantage of the growth - one site in the heart of downtown Palmetto (leading to the store we'll be touring today) and the other site in the newer growth part of the area (which would bring us store #4477 - a tour for another day).


     Albertsons was able to bring this store to downtown Palmetto as part of a redevelopment plan. This store was built on the site of an abandoned shopping center once anchored by a store called Mr. C's Community Market, which had closed in 1998. Sitting at a prime corner in the heart of town, the abandoned supermarket was a bit unsightly. The new Albertsons would bring a much needed new grocery option to town, as well as serve as a symbol of revitalization to the area. The new Albertsons opened on June 4, 2002, as one of the last handful of Albertsons stores to open in Florida.


     At the time of Albertsons' opening, the only competition the new store faced was a Kash n' Karry located a few blocks away (oddly situated off a side street too). In addition to that, Winn-Dixie had a store on the eastern edge of town, and Publix's closest store was way out in Ellenton. Albertsons found themselves a nice location in the middle of town with this store, and even though Albertsons only lasted 6 years here, I don't think this was a poorly performing store - I think this store ended up in Publix's hands due to its strong location. This was one of the 49 Floridian Albertsons stores sold to Publix in 2008, a store Publix wasted no time in reopening. Before 2008 even ended, Publix was up and running out of this building, with Publix's grand opening happening on December 18, 2008. Opening in Palmetto brought a completely new location into Publix's store fleet, as this store was far enough away from any other existing Publix to lead to a replacement situation.


     As you can tell, Publix's speedy conversion in 2008 left the building in mostly original form. From this vantage point looking across the front walkway, we still have a very strong Albertsons feel here as we look toward the entryway. If it weren't for Publix's typical green recycling bin crashing this photo, you'd think Albertsons had never left the building.


     The Palmetto Albertsons was a typical early 2000's store, aligned with the fresh departments on the right side of the building. In this photo we can see the very much original-to-Albertsons entryway, inclusive of the arched windows above the doors.


     Stepping inside and turning to the right, we find the deli counter. While the counter itself if located along the right side wall in the corner, Albertsons would have had a prepared foods counter and prep space to my right, behind the coolers of ice tea that Publix installed. Publix still uses part of Albertsons old prepared foods prep area as the Pub Sub station, although most of the area is now blocked by those coolers.


     A mid-2010's remodel to this store brought about the Classy Market 3.0 decor, that remodel wiping away any obvious Albertsons decor remnants Publix may have left behind in the original conversion. While the design of this building is most typically associated with the Grocery Palace decor, that's actually not the decor this store opened with. Interestingly, come 2002, Albertsons has reintroduced its Blue and Green Awnings decor as a replacement for Grocery Palace in new-build stores of the time. That's what this store opened and (most likely) closed with, looking something like this. The second wave of Blue and Green Awnings decor lasted from 2002-2003, with the last few Albertsons stores to open in Florida in the late 2003-2004 time frame getting the rare Santa Fe decor.


     This photo looks toward the sub station and Albertsons' old prepared foods counter.


     Overall, the deli occupies a rather large area in the front right corner of the store, this photo giving us a nice overview of the entire department. Some pre-made foods and specialty cheeses are located in the island cooler in the middle of the department.


     Following the deli, we next encounter the produce department. While not as bad as the monster 70,000 square foot Publix in the former Jewel-Osco, there were a few places in this nearly 60,000 square foot former Albertsons that seemed a bit overly spaced out, such as this transition area between the deli and produce. The front end is another area where we'll see Publix had trouble filling in the extra space, those pictures coming up later in this post.


     A good chunk of space was dedicated to the produce department, although Publix was a bit generous with the spacing of the displays to fill the large area they inherited from Albertsons.


     Here's a look back at what we've covered so far, with the deli in the background of this photo taken from within the produce department.


     Take a close look at the two aisle markers in the background of this image. In a very unusual move for Publix, the entirety of the produce department was given the designation of Aisle 1, with Aisle 2 being the half aisle of shelves to my right. Typically in situations like this, the grocery shelves bordering the produce department would be part of Aisle 1, with produce left as-is without any numbering. Publix isn't one for fluffing the aisle count to make a store feel larger, as Publix isn't a company that likes running big stores to begin with, so I was surprised to see this. However, Publix's little tactic of numbering the produce department as Aisle 1 pushed this store over the edge when it came to aisle numbering, as this store has the highest aisle count I've ever encountered at any Publix. We'll see how high the numbers go later in this post, but for now back to Aisle 1 the produce department:


     Unlike the crazy flooring from the Grocery Palace decor, these early 2000's stores that opened with Blue and Green Awnings decor would have used a plain white vinyl tile throughout. Publix ripped out all the old tiles from Albertsons prior to moving in, replacing the white tile with some colored tile patterns around the perimeter of the store. The remainder of the salesfloor is covered with a faux terrazzo flooring, a common choice for Publix when moving into a building that wasn't theirs originally.


     Leaving the produce department, we find the bakery located on the store's back wall.


     Albertsons' old bakery was significantly remodeled after Publix moved in, although the Classy Market 3.0 remodel was most likely when the major work was done to change this department to one more in-line with Publix's standards. I believe these Blue and Green Awnings stores also had the angled ceiling over the bakery like their Grocery Palace counterparts, a feature Publix has since ripped out for their standard curved front.


     The bakery counter at this store seemed unusually wide to me, however, that could just be because Publix usually stuffs their bakery into a corner, so you rarely ever see one as spread out as this.


     With some displays of baked goods in the middle of the back aisle, here's one final look toward produce as we continue to move deeper into this store.


     We'll cut down aisle 3 to return to the front for a moment...


     Looking across the front of the store, the pharmacy island becomes visible to my left. The pharmacy island is another holdover from Albertsons, a design trait that allowed the pharmacy counter to be immediately in front of you upon entering the store.


     Albertsons would have had a large health and beauty department in the aisles opposite the pharmacy counter, taking up the first half of these few aisles. When Publix moved in, health and beauty was consolidated into the entirety of aisles 7 and 8, freeing up more space for Publix's grocery aisles.


     The pharmacy counter was heavily modified by Publix through the years, like most of the other service departments in this store.


     Aisle 5 is home to a very large selection of international products, courtesy of this store's larger than average size.


     Following the bakery, the next service department we find along the store's back wall is the meat and seafood counter.


     Random comment: Even though Classy Market 3.0 is officially retired, Publix did a really good job of making that decor look nice in any building they added it to. Even though Publix modified the service departments to their liking in this store's last remodel, the rest of the (mostly-untouched) former Albertsons store looks like it was always intended to have this decor. Classy Market 3.0 was a very adaptable decor, and it will be interesting to see how well Evergreen adapts to Publix's older and acquired stores.


     The store's meat coolers follow the service counter, stretching almost all the way to the other side of the store.


     Returning to the grocery aisles, here's one of those consolidated health and beauty aisles I mentioned before.


     Following health and beauty, we find this aisle, home to everything you'd ever need for your next beach outing - beach toys, local souvenirs, and beer. While this store isn't near any popular beach spots, it is within half an hour's drive of two famous Gulf Coast beach destinations: St. Pete Beach and Anna Maria Island. Most likely Publix had an extra aisle's worth of space in this oversized store and didn't know what else to put here, so beach stuff it was. (And this is Florida, so no matter where a store is, beach stuff sells well here!)


     Getting closer to the left side of the store, the meat coolers transition into dairy coolers.


     Cutting down another aisle, we find a large selection of magazines and greeting cards down here.


     The store's floral department is set into the side of the pharmacy island, facing the front check lanes.


     Even though 15-16 aisles is about average for a Publix store, in this photo we can see the numbers getting much higher than that, meaning there's still a good amount of store to cover...



     We can see the signage for the dairy department above the milk coolers in the corner. Dairy wraps along the side wall into the store's last aisle, with additional dairy signage down there too.


     I'm sure poor aisle 15, seen here, had a rough time last year...



     Looking toward the meat and seafood counter once again, this photo looks back at what we've covered so far.


     Within aisle 18, we can discover what type of champagne will pair well with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (the lunch combo of choice for the budget-conscious gourmet).


     Snack foods in aisle 19, and we've yet to run out of aisles...


     From the back left corner of the store, here's a look across the width of the building. It's a pretty big place from this vantage point, the green paint from the produce department barely visible in the background.


     The last two aisles of the store are home to frozen foods. Since the last aisle is actually longer than the one I'm standing in, that little pass-through was added about halfway through the center coolers.


     At long last we've made it to the final aisle in the store - aisle 21. Like I said before, an average Publix will have somewhere around 15-16 aisles, and some of Publix's larger stores may hit the 17-18 aisle range. It's extremely rare to see a Publix store with an aisle count over 20 (as even the monster Pub-Osco we saw back in December topped out at 15 aisles). While the Pub-Osco building we toured in Palm Harbor was much bigger than this store in Palmetto, Publix had everything more spaced out at the Palm Harbor store than they do here.


     Dairy occupies the side wall throughout most of aisle 21, with the rest of the aisle being home to frozen foods.


     Rounding the corner out of frozen foods, we find ourselves at the front end once again. Publix had a large open space they inherited from Albertsons between the check lanes and the frozen food coolers, so in an attempt to fill the void, a large display of bottled water and Bud Light was created to fill the space.


     Pulling the camera back just a bit further, here's a better look at how the last frozen food aisle sticks out from the remainder of the grocery aisles.


     A wide aisle separates the check lanes from the grocery aisles. While all this extra space must come in handy on days when this store is especially busy, you can tell this was a result of Publix getting more room than they'd have liked from buying this big former Albertsons building.



     This photo serves as my best example of how spacious the front end really is here. The aisle is wide enough to make the front end feel big, but not wide enough to where Publix could put displays out here without making the front end feel cluttered and cramped.


     Even though Publix had the space to do so, they never moved the service desk to an island by the check lanes during the Classy Market 3.0 remodel. Instead, the service desk is still located along the wall by the front doors. In stores with the Grocery Palace decor, Albertsons would have had the service desk on the back wall of the pharmacy island originally. However, since this store was newer, I don't know if the layout was tweaked and the service desk was always in the spot we see here, or if Publix moved the desk here (replacing either a photo counter or video rental space from Albertsons).


     Here's one last interior photo of this store, showing the hallway between the doors and the pharmacy island.


     Although a bit on the large side for Publix's liking, Publix has done a nice job of making this store their own. The building is modern (even if it is pushing 20 years old now - was 2002 really that long ago?!) and Publix's decor fits the place well, so hopefully Publix gets a nice long run out of this building Albertsons gave up.


     Lastly, here's a photo of the attached liquor store, located on the right side of the building.

     With our tour out of the way, let's jump into the usual satellite imagery, starting off with some Bird's Eye aerial images courtesy of Bing Maps:


Front - Publix repainted the store from a brown and beige paint scheme to the gray and blue scheme sometime in the last few years, which we've seen with a few other Publixsons stores recently too.


Right Side


Back


Left Side

     And now for some historic satellite imagery, courtesy of Google Earth:


Former Albertsons #4484 - 2019


Former Albertsons #4484 - 2013 - Publix must be doing good business here, from the looks of that parking lot.


Albertsons #4484 - 2008


Albertsons #4484 - December 2002 - A brand new Albertsons store can be seen here.


Future Albertsons #4484 - April 2002 - The store was still under construction when this satellite image was captured, but the building and most major work seems to have been completed.


Future Albertsons #4484 - 1998 - The abandoned Mr. C's Market building can be seen at the top of the image. Albertsons' building would be placed over Mr. C's old store, with Albertsons' parking lot being built over those few small buildings on the corner below.


     And that is the story of Albertsons #4484 in Palmetto. I was able to dig up an old photo of this store from its short 6-year life as an Albertsons, which is what we'll close out this post with. For my next post we'll stay in the area for another fun supermarket tour, so be sure to come back in two weeks for that!

So until next time,

The Albertsons Florida Blogger

15 comments:

  1. Nice post, The only other (now closed) store I know that topped 20 or so is the old Bay Pointe Plaza. I seen stores top off 19 aisles before. I don't think you will get enough info or have any footage for new tenants and other stuff but I have an idea suggestion cause you're by Bradenton/Sarasota. 1. Publix Parkwood Square and Bradenton Commons and their older stores they replaced North River Village and Cortez Commons. 2. Cortez Plaza possibly, as Publix was there before. 3. The vacant Sarasota Commons.

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    1. Thanks! Besides this store, the only other time I’ve experienced a Publix with 20 or more aisles was at the Parrish Publixsons, which is right down the road from here and essentially an exact clone of this store. 15-17 aisles seems to be Publix’s sweet spot, with any counts higher than that only being found in buildings acquired from someone else. I’ll keep those other places in mind next time I’m out that way, although the Bradenton Common store will a definite stop for me, as that’s an old Jewel-Osco and Albertsons!

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  2. I don't know, even with your writer's block, your intro talking about your writer's block was pretty good, haha! And as for the store itself -- it's very cool to see this one, because (having been in a few former Albertsons stores built in the same era) it's neat to see just how intact Publix kept the layout here. It feels like aside from the décor, this could still easily pass as an Albertsons. Isn't it kind of unusual for Publix to change so little, layout-wise? I'm thinking of the bakery and especially the pharmacy/floral island specifically. Either way, it allows for several Publix scenes we don't often get to experience, so I dig it (as well as the "budget-conscious gourmet" aisle!).

    I agree with your comment about CM3.0 being a very nice adaptable décor -- it looks very good in here, even with those nontraditional department placements like I just mentioned (as well as frozen, which it seems we don't always get to see signage for in a Publix). And as for the original décor of this store -- I know you've mentioned the Blue & Green Awnings revival before, but it's still just a little weird to me to know that décor was slapped on what is otherwise very clearly a completely unaltered Grocery Palace layout! I think that would have been pretty crazy to see, back in the day.

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    1. Hey, if you can’t beat writer’s block, I guess writing about writer’s block is the next best thing! 😊 But yes, besides a few very minor tweaks, the layout of this store is identical to what Albertsons had. Publix reopened this store after only a few months’ transition period, so there wasn’t time to do anything crazy here. As far as conversions are concerned, it’s actually fairly common for Publix to take over a competitor’s store and do practically nothing to the layout. The vast majority of the Albertsons stores Publix has taken over have seen very little modification to the original layout, even after all these years (as usually tear downs and rebuilds will happen if Publix is really that unhappy with one of these stores). Publix might change the look of a department (like what happened with the bakery here), but rarely will they bother to move a department somewhere else.

      It would have really thrown me off stepping into this store when Albertsons was here, seeing Blue and Green Awnings instead of Grocery Palace. This design was developed specifically for Grocery Palace, so anything but that décor would have been really odd to see with this layout! I still find it weird how that décor had the short-lived early 2000’s revival, as you rarely hear of a décor package getting revived like that.

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  3. It is interesting to see a Publixsons of this age because 2002 would be the last year that Albertsons opened a new location in Houston. Technically, I think Albertsons only opened one store here in 2002 (they left town in 2003 I think), but there were several store openings in 2000-2001. With that in mind, I didn't realize that Albertsons went back to the Blue & Green Awnings decor after the Grocery Palace came out. I wonder why that happened. Perhaps the Grocery Palace decor was just too expensive and/or not well-received by the public?

    I did think that maybe the Grocery Palace was the wrong decor for Albertsons at the time in Houston because the biggest problem Albertsons had in this market is a perception that their prices were too high. Around that same time, HEB was expanding in Houston and were building some of their first regular, non-Pantry stores here in Houston. HEB used decor that was the definition of austere, which they still use today, and I think that helped communicate their low price message. Poor Albertsons, they just couldn't get it right with decor here in Houston. The Blue & Grey Market was just too plain compared to the Randall's and neon Kroger stores they competed with and the Grocery Palace might have been too much. Perhaps Albertsons thought Awnings was the right compromise between the two. It's hard to say.

    Speaking of all of this, I assumed that the lastest-built Albertsons in town (that I know of) would have had the Grocery Palace decor, but maybe that isn't the case. That Albertsons is now a Big Lots and a 99 Cents Only location. While the Big Lots very much looks like an Albertsons on the outside, I don't see much evidence of it looking like Albertsons on the inside: https://goo.gl/maps/7Sq2GT3imE7yZ9ENA

    As far as this Palmetto Publixsons goes, it does look like. I agree with you and Retail Retell that the CM3.0 decor looks nice here and it probably looks nice just about anywhere. It's a little strange to me to see an ex-Albertsons of this vintage looking spaced out as Publix keeps it because Krogertsons of similar vintage are usually the opposite. Krogertsons are usually smaller than the stores Kroger built themselves in the 1990s-early 2000s. At least it feels that way. The same is true with HEBertsons. In case you have not seen an HEBertsons, here's one. This is a rare Houston HEB with floor covering: https://goo.gl/maps/ivL5nc5BDoJcGEKJ7

    About the only trace of Albertsons I could find inside is this tiled wall: https://goo.gl/maps/HhPde8bZnhfR4FBFA

    The local Grocery Palace Krogertsons more or less has the somewhat limited selection of products that one usually finds at surviving Greenhouse Krogers. Oddly enough, the local Blue & Grey era Krogertsons has a slightly more expanded selection of offerings, in frozen food especially, as compared to the ex-Grocery Palace store.

    I really like the flooring pattern Publix uses at the Palmetto store near the customer service desk and in other corners of the store. That's pretty neat. I really miss grocers who take flooring seriously!

    Although I didn't remember the name specifically, I did end up in Palmetto while exploring interesting independent grocers in Florida several months ago. The Detwiler's Farm Market there looks like a knockoff Sprouts with their early 2010s decor (or maybe Srrouts knocked off Detwiler's, lol): https://g.page/detwilersmarketpalmetto?share

    Check out those outstanding user ratings for Detwiler's! They make Publix's Google ratings look like a dumpy Winn-Dixie in comparison!

    The Ellenton Acapulco Tropical y Mas is pretty neat, but you've done a MFR post about that recently. For some reason, their website says that location is in Bradenton. I don't know why.

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    1. Here's just a quick addition to my earlier comments. I did some searching on a great website that has an archive of all kinds of media from the North Texas (Dallas-Ft. Worth Metroplex) area including news clips from decades ago. In there, I found some old TV news clips involving Albertsons which might be of interest to you and your readers since I know old videos from inside Albertsons are kind of rare.

      1. Here's a great clip from 1991 showing many parts of an Albertsons store. I'm not familiar with this decor package, but I'm guessing this is Colorful Transitions given the gradients? Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc993713/m1/

      2. Here's some indoor video from 2001 of a Blue & Grey Market Albertsons. Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1505305/m1/

      3. Here's some extended outdoor video from the outside of a Skaggs Albertsons in 1977. Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1128656/m1/

      Here are some non-Albertsons videos which might be of interest:

      4. Here's a 1984 news clip about Kmart selling banking services in Texas. There's a line in the clip that these were not doing as well in Texas as they did in Florida. I suppose Sears wasn't the only one with a 'Socks & Stocks' retail strategy in the 1980s! Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1175842/m1/

      5. Here are some interior views of a Safeway Marina store in 1984. Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1244550/m1/

      6. A Sam's Club store...in 1983! Link: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1162064/m1/

      Anyway, I hope you enjoy these. I'm sure you'll like the Albertsons clips if nothing else if you have not seen them before!

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    2. Albertsons opened a lot of new stores at the turn of the 2000’s, with the growth beginning to drop after many of the divisions began to fail come 2002 or so (like Memphis, Houston, Oklahoma, etc.) I think Albertsons was opening so many stores at the time come 2002, with many divisions teetering on the edge, that Grocery Palace simply became too expensive to install on such a widespread basis. I don’t know this for sure, but that’s my theory as to why Blue and Green Awnings had its brief revival.

      It's really hard to know for sure if an Albertsons opened in 2002 had Grocery Palace or Blue and Green Awnings without seeing a picture from the time the store was open. I only know this store had Blue and Green Awnings because the stores opened both before and after it had that décor, and YonWoo may have tracked down a picture of this store with Blue and Green Awnings visible in it. The exterior designs and layouts in these Blue and Green Awning stores were identical to their Grocery Palace counterparts, so that doesn’t leave any clues either. It looks like Big Lots and 99 Cents Only completely rebuilt the interior of that building, so the décor from Albertsons will have to remain a mystery for now.

      When it comes to running large stores, Kroger and Publix are polar opposites. Kroger loves to build their stores as big as possible, with non-Marketplace stores going over 100,000 square feet. That being said, Kroger can find plenty to cram into a 60,000 square foot former Albertsons, with the store possibly feeling small to Kroger! Publix hates big stores, as they rarely build anything over 55,000 square feet themselves. Since Publix prefers a smaller building, you can sometimes tell Publix is really overwhelmed by all the extra space. That HEBertsons was quite interesting, especially since it still retains the Grocery Palace layout too!

      The flooring in the Publixsons is really nice, as I like the border Publix installed into the perimeter, which transitions into the fake terrazzo. As for those independent grocers you mention, all I’ll say about Detwiler’s is that store is really neat, and come back for my next post!

      Those are some interesting clips you found there! I haven’t seen those before. The one with the Colorful Transition Market Albertsons is interesting, as there isn’t a lot of documentation of that décor out there since it disappeared so long ago. It was basically a modified version of Blue and Gray Market with more colors and some different fonts. The Skaggs-Albertsons footage and the interior video of the Marina Safeway was interesting too. You don’t ever see much from Sam’s Club’s early days, so that was an interesting video too!

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  5. What a nice Publixsons! You may recall on my trip to Oregon and Utah in 2018, I visited 2 stores in the Medford area. The one on Ross Ln (store #3593) in Medford opened in 1999 with Grocery Palace. I also visited store #3595 in neighboring Central Point seen here:https://flic.kr/p/26yxFav. I have a feeling that store opened in either 2001 or 2002 like this Palmetto Albertsons, and must have had the Blue and Green Awnings decor package. The reason I point that Oregon store out is that it had 23 aisles! Those Albertsons stores were huge in the early 2000's. I think it's odd that Publix cant figure out a way to utilize that space, but they do.
    Man was this store busy as an Albertsons (all the way up to 2008)! I really think it sucks that Albertsons couldn't figure out a better distribution network to keep obviously profitable stores like this one, #4304, #4466, and Largo opened longer. The Tampa Bay Region, especially Pinellas and Manatee Counties were Albertsons two best regions in Florida from what I have been able to tell. These areas had so much competition too-from not only Publix, but Winn-Dixie and Kash 'n Karry (Sweetbay). The fact that Albertsons held what I think was the number 2 grocery position in Pinellas County during the early 2000's tells me that they were very strong at one time.

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    1. Central Point had a now-abandoned garden center.

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    2. 619_mitch, cool! I didn't spend too much time at that store and didn't even notice the abandoned Garden Center. I think I might be wrong about the opening date of central point's store , #3595, only being two digits from the Ross Ln. store in Medford makes me think it opened at nearly the same time, in 2000 maybe.

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    3. Yes – I remember those photos (and the cake too!). While early Grocery Palace stores typically averaged in the 55,000 square foot range, getting into the 2002-2004 timeframe, the stores began to get larger, hitting 60,000+ square feet on average. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Palmetto Albertsons had 23 aisles originally, with Publix spreading out the aisles after the conversion to hide the extra space they couldn’t fill.

      I’d be surprised if this wasn’t a successful store for Albertsons. The location was great and competition was minimal on this side of town, and I think Albertsons success is what may have drawn Publix to this building in the end. Up until the big purge in 2012, Bradenton/Sarasota was home to 3 of the 17 remaining Albertsons stores in Florida, which is a decent presence for a company down to so few stores at the time. Albertsons had quite a bit of success on this piece of the Gulf Coast, although it still wasn’t enough to save the Florida division in the end.

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  6. There were 2 early 2000's Albertsons built in SoCal with Blue & Green Awnings:
    San Diego-City Heights was built as part of an "urban renewal" project in 2001. It closed in 2014 and is now an El Super (Mexican supermarket). It had the same layout as 4466.
    Orange-East Chapman was built in 2002. It it still open with its original decor. Interior layout is similar to a Jewel-Osco built around the same time.

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    1. Interesting! Looking at pictures of the Orange-East Chapman store on Google Maps, the Blue and Green Awnings décor doesn’t look too bad in one of these early 2000’s Albertsons stores. That décor is a bit dated by modern standards, but it still looks presentable in that store. Albertsons #4495 in Orlando would have been identical to the East Chapman store when it opened, as that one used the Jewel-Osco layout and opened with Blue and Green Awnings too.

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