In the world of retail blogs, while we see many pop up and have a good run for a few years, it seems like there are many that come and go before fading off into obscurity. However, some blogs have stuck it out for the long haul, such as JE's Louisiana & Texas Retail Blog (founded 2009), Pseudo3D's Brazos Buildings & Businesses (founded 2010), and the longtime supermarket fan site Grocerteria (founded 1999!) as some notable mentions of retail blogs that have kept the posts going for 10+ years (and maybe in the coming years we'll see additional retail blogs hit that mark too). Come December 6, 2023, AFB will be joining the 10 year club, and I've put together a fun series of posts to mark the occasion. Over the next month we'll be visiting some interesting new stores and looking back at some notable mentions from the blog's last decade on the web, culminating with the blog's special anniversary post on December 6th. So there's a lot of good stuff coming up in the coming weeks, and at the end of this post will be my schedule between now and December 6th, each date having a corresponding theme or clue after it as a hint to what we'll be seeing each day. So please be sure to take a look at the schedule below, and come back next Sunday, November 12th, for our first 10th anniversary celebration store tour!
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AFB's 10th Anniversary Celebration - Schedule of Events:
November 5, 2023 - Introduction
November 12, 2023 - What's Old is New Again
November 19, 2023 - A Palace Lies Beneath
November 26, 2023 - The 1980's Called and They Want Their Supermarket Back
November 29, 2023 - In A Parallel Universe... (Guest Post by the Sing Oil Blogger)
December 3, 2023 - To Go Where AFB Has Not Gone Before
December 6, 2023 - This Blog is My Grocery Palace
I'm looking forward to the month of AFB! This should be a lot of fun. Not only am I a retail history buff, but I also like to informally chronicle the history of online retail enthusiasm (I suppose that is the best way of putting it, lol) given that I've been following it since the early days of the Deadmalls website, Labelscar, and soon we'll reach the 20th anniversary of when retail photos started popping up on Flickr. I'm glad to see my fellow Texans and online retail friends Je and Pseudo3D get mentioned as certainly they're also a big part of that retail enthusiast history, but you're certainly a big part of that history as well! So, with that, it'll be interesting to look back, look forward, and to look up at the big bucket of Coca-Cola in Beverage Boulevard!
ReplyDeleteIt seems like there have been a few retail fan sites around since the early days of the internet in the late 1990's, but I feel like it was the late 2000's when the retail history documentation hobby began to take off. It was the late 2000's when I began finding all these websites, but it took me until 2013 to find a topic I wanted to write about a begin a blog. It's great that you've been involved in this hobby for so long, and it seems like Texans are pretty dedicated to preserving their retail history for the long run!
DeleteExciting milestone (and I'm glad that I get to help you celebrate)! While some of the clues aren't as clear (and others are obviously about a Grocery Palace store), all I can think about with the December 3rd post is to add the subtitle "The Central Time Zone," lol!
ReplyDeleteThanks for contributing a post to the occasion! Since Grocery Palace is my favorite supermarket decor of all time, it should make sense that some of these posts would involve that decor in some way :)
DeleteSadly, the clue for the December 3rd post isn't a geographic reference - our destination that day is very much in the Eastern Time Zone. Time traveling will just have to wait until another day!
Happy upcoming 10-year blogiversary, friend!! I've thoroughly enjoyed your content in the years I've been following it, and can't wait to see what all you've got planned for this celebration. Sounds like a lot of exciting stuff, so that's awesome! I love the 10-year graphic you created, too!
ReplyDeleteThanks! You're not too far from your 10-year blogiversary either, so hopefully we'll get to see you hit that milestone soon too!
DeleteGlad you like the graphic as well - it's the finest my poor graphic design skills and Microsoft Word could make! :)
Congratulations on 10 years, or I guess 10 years very soon! That is an incredible accomplishment. Quite a major blogiversary for sure! I always enjoy everything you post and I'm looking forward to lots more coming soon!
ReplyDeleteThanks! I sometimes can't believe I've kept the blog up this long too. Glad you've been enjoying this adventure of mine and plenty more to come soon!
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