Former Albertsons #4430 - Coral Springs, FL (Turtle Run)

 

Albertsons #4430 / Super Saver #1533

6355 W. Sample Road, Coral Springs, FL - Turtle Run Shoppes

Today's post is a presentation of Broward County Retail

     While today's former Albertsons store isn't very exciting in terms of its new life, there is a small milestone for me that will come from this post - this store is the last of the Super Saver conversions I have to cover out of the 11 of those to have existed throughout Florida. Maybe not the biggest achievement out there (like covering all of the Albertsons to Publix conversions out there - still got a while on that one!), but it's little things like this which let me know I am slowly but surely whittling though my backlog to the eventual goal of getting all these former Floridian Albertsons stores posted in some form. Anyway, we return to South Florida to take a look at another former Broward County Albertsons store, and one of the 3 Albertsons stores to have once called Coral Springs home (today's store being the middle child of those three locations in town):

     Plans for Albertsons #4430 first arose in late 1994, when Albertsons expressed interest in building a new store on an empty anchor pad at the south end of Turtle Run Shoppes, a Walmart-anchored complex located at the northwestern corner of State Route 7/US 441 and Sample Road, a major highway junction that had recently been upgraded to a full interchange. Walmart and its attached shopping center had been at the site since 1990 (although the article says 1988, but everything else I've found said 1990), one of the first major developments which would lead to this intersection becoming a major hub for retail in Northern Broward County. When the plans for Albertsons' new store came to light though, those plans drew the ire of some environmentalists due to part of Albertsons' proposed parking lot taking over a portion of land that was supposed to be preserved due to its environmental significance (per the original site plans filed by Walmart). As part of the conditions for allowing the proposed parking lot to be built, the developer agreed to preserve a larger piece of land elsewhere on the Turtle Run site in exchange for taking the original land, a situation environmentalists felt would set a bad precedent. However, since the original land was preserved by a site plan condition and not a direct act of Coral Springs' city council, the city agreed to the swap, paving the way for the new Albertsons to be built.

     Albertsons #4430 opened on schedule in early 1996, a pretty typical mid-1990's Albertsons store that would have looked just like this (with the exact orientation of that drawing too). Unlike Coral Springs' original Albertsons (#4332), which dated back to 1979 and remained in operation until being sold to Publix in 2008, Albertsons' later to attempts to establish more stores in town turned out to be pretty big flops (especially with the last of those stores - #4449 - which made #4430 look like a success story in comparison). #4430 operated for 9 years as an Albertsons before being chosen as one of the chain's underperforming locations to receive a Super Saver conversion in 2005, with corporate hoping the new discount format would breathe new life into these ailing stores. However, with the breakup of Albertsons in 2006, the answer to that question would remain a mystery as the new owners of the Floridian Albertsons stores (Cerberus Capital Management) immediately closed all 11 Super Savers in the state shortly after acquiring them. While there wasn't much in the newspaper archives about this store in particular, I did manage to find a copy of Super Saver's going out of business ad, which also applied to the only other South Florida Super Saver location, housed in old #4375 in Sunrise.

     Ross appears to have taken over this building sometime between 2008 and 2010, setting up shop in the right half of this former Albertsons store. The left half of the building sat empty until 2017, when that was partially demolished and reconfigured to serve as a strip of smaller storefronts, now housing America's Best Eyeglasses, SuperCuts, and Cycle Gear.

     Turning our attention to the left side of the building, here we see America's Best, which occupies the front left corner of the old Albertsons building. As part of the reconfiguration of this side of the building, Albertsons' old loading docks (which were located on the building's left side due to space constraints behind) were completely removed with the left wall being moved inward a little bit to accommodate a new parking lot for the tenants housed along the side of the building (SuperCuts and Cycle Gear).

     At the time I took these photos, only the America's Best and SuperCuts spaces were occupied, with Cycle Gear still not having made their move into the units at the far back of the old Albertsons space.

     While the left side of the old Albertsons building is practically new construction, Ross preserved Albertsons' original facade during their renovations, giving us a glimpse at what this building would have looked like back in its glory days of the late 1990's.

     The original Albertsons can lights still exist under the canopy too, although I'm not sure if the stone around the columns is a more modern addition from when Ross moved in or not, as that stone style seems to be associated with buildings from the 2000's and 2010's compared to a mid-1990's build.

     The original canopy features extend all the way across to the old liquor store, which was located on the right side of the building abutting the main strip of stores. Ross did replace Albertsons' old swinging doors with new sliding doors of their own, looking very much like how Publix would have replaced the doors in a similar conversion of their own.

     Heading inside Ross, well, it's a Ross. You enter the store into the women's shoe department in the front right corner, followed by women's clothes occupying most of the right side and center of the salesfloor. Housewares, toys, and other assorted stuff is located in the back of the store, with men's clothing located along the left side (which is the layout of 99% of the Ross stores out there).

     As you'd imagine, Ross gutted and rebuilt the interior, as we've seen in every other Rossbertsons conversion in existence. When Albertsons was here, the photo above would have been looking down the store's grand aisle from the bakery (in the front right corner) looking through produce toward the deli, located in the back right corner of the store.

     The deli counter would have been to my right when Albertsons was here, this part of the store now home to wall art, gift bags, and whatever other et cetera Ross had for sale this day.

     The part of the building that was converted into the strip of stores would have housed Albertsons' general merchandise aisles and the pharmacy and alcohol departments. All of that would have been located straight ahead of me, behind the partition wall now in the distance.

     For the reputation Ross stores seem to have, this one was kept in particularly tidy shape. I don't see anything thrown on the floor, and the merchandise seemed as neatly stocked or hung as it could be in a store like this.

     Along the partition wall were men's socks and shoes, with Albertsons' frozen food department formerly located in this general area.

     While Ross stores have looked like what we've just seen for years and years now, it appears newer Ross stores have taken on a new look recently (and by new, I mean a cheaper, look). See here for an example of a Ross store opened in 2023, featuring a warehouse ceiling, plainer looking department signage, and all white walls. The floor tile pattern looks the same as what we see here in Coral Springs, but at least the blue accents on the walls, the drop ceiling, and the curved department signs here add a tiny bit more to the ambience!

     For our final photo inside Ross, here's a look through the check lanes toward the front doors, through which we will go to take a quick look at the old liquor store.

     Looking from the liquor store back toward Ross's entrance, here's some more of the original canopy elements for all of us to take in.

     Located to the right of the main store, the old liquor store was sitting empty at the time of my visit. The old liquor store had been left vacant and mostly untouched for many years after Super Saver closed (and I promise you that's not me peeking through the glass in that linked GSV either, but what timing to have captured someone doing just that!). However, in 2019, the old liquor store space was gutted and rebuilt to accommodate a new tenant - Toy Express - a locally owned toy store. Toy Express only seems to have lasted a year or two, with the old liquor store sitting vacant yet again after that closed.

     I visited this store after Toy Express closed, and by this time the original Albertsons liquor store doors had been replaced and the inside rebuilt and made to look quite plain. I tried to take a picture through the glass in the door but the photo turned out all black, however from what I've seen online from Toy Express and its eventual replacement, we didn't miss much.

Photo Courtesy Evan D. on Google Maps

     Unlike the chronic plague of emptiness that seems to haunt these former Albertsons liquor stores, by early 2024, another new tenant decided to give this space a try - that new tenant being a thrift store called The Shed. 

Photo courtesy The Shed Thrift Store on Google Maps

     For a quick glimpse inside the liquor store space, I pulled a few photos from The Shed's Google Maps page showing how new drywall was installed to hide where all of Albertsons' beer coolers used to be and how the old floor tiles were ripped out in favor of the bare concrete beneath. The above photo is looking toward the right side of the old liquor store space, with the old walk in coolers formerly lining the back of the salesfloor.

Photo courtesy The Shed Thrift Store on Google Maps

     The left side of The Shed is more of what I just described, with the most interesting subjects in the photo being some of the merchandise and not the building itself! I actually like those old stained glass lampshades like the one see here, which was for sale and not actually set up as a functioning piece of the store's decor!

     Back out in the parking lot, that's all there is to see of old #4430 anymore. However, I did mention there was a Walmart in this shopping center at one time. Since we're here and I could use a few more photos to fill this post out, would you care to walk over there and see what has become of that building?

     For context, here's an aerial image showing the entirety of Turtle Run Shoppes. The old Albertsons is the building at the southern end of the strip, with the old Walmart being the large building at the top of the image. Walmart remained at Turtle Run Shoppes until 2002, when the company built a new Supercenter across the street. Not long after Walmart made their move, the former Walmart building became home to a store that would end up complimenting the future Ross at the other end of the strip quite well: Burlington (then Coat Factory).

     Being a Burlington from the early 2000's, the store takes up the entirety of the roughly 80,000 square foot former Walmart building. As of early 2025, Burlington remains in this same location occupying all of that space, but I can't speak for how much of that large salesfloor space is still in use by Burlington today. I'd have to imagine Burlington will either relocate this store to a smaller building or sublet part of the building to another tenant if either of those opportunities arise, considering the company's recent shift to smaller stores.

     From what I can tell, Burlington didn't change much about the store's facade or entryway from the Walmart days. With Coral Springs being a more upscale suburb of Fort Lauderdale with stricter building codes, I'd have to imagine the store's non-standard facade was Walmart's doing to class up this store a bit, with Burlington keeping what they inherited.

     The vestibule is pretty much all original from Walmart, complete with the old pairs of manual and automatic swinging doors for the entrances and exits.

     Getting inside the store, Burlington completely stripped and rebuilt the interior to look like an average Burlington.

     We'll do a quick loop around the store and take in all the sights Burlington has to offer these days.

     I found the coats!

     This little patch of empty shelving in the housewares department was one of the only sparse sections of this 80,000 square foot Burlington I saw when I was here a few years back. Compared to the images I've seen of other massive-size older Burlington stores where a large chunk of the salesfloor was left empty, this wasn't too bad!

     Much like the Ross at the other end of the plaza, this Burlington wasn't too shopworn either, and was surprisingly neat in comparison to how many other Burlington stores are described. Looking at the above image a little closer, it looks like someone ditched that red dress in the pants aisle, but hey, one item out of place like that is a good day at Burlington!

     Here's one last photo inside Burlington, looking toward a display of watches. I guess that means it's about time to wrap up this post, which I will do momentarily after a final few exterior photos:

     Off on the far left side of the old Walmart building is the store's former garden center. Due to space constraints, the garden center was built onto the front of the building and slightly tucked into the corner where the strip of stores branches off to the south. Being that Burlington hasn't ventured into selling plants (which is probably a good thing), the old Walmart garden center has been left to sit empty for the last 20 years.

     A break in the foliage gives us a glimpse at this chained-up gate, which I believe used to be Walmart's main garden center entrance. Through the gate we see some doors and an empty concrete pad, some of the last few relics floating around out here.

     Walking back down the plaza to the old Albertsons, here's a parting shot of it as we transition into some aerial imagery to end this post with, starting off with Bird's Eye aerial images courtesy of Bing Maps:

Front

Right Side

Back

Left Side

     And now for some historic aerial images, courtesy of Google Earth:

Former Albertsons #4430 - 2024

Former Albertsons #4430 - 2017 - The building still in its original form before the left side loading docks were ripped out a few months later.

Former Albertsons #4430 - 2007 - A totally abandoned building here

Super Saver #1533 - 2006

Albertsons #4430 - 2003

Albertsons #4430 - 1999

Future Albertsons #4430 - 1995 - The pad site Albertsons would later build on. The patch of trees on the right side of the image seem to be the ones that caused a bit of a stir when the plans for this store were first released. Even those many of those trees remained after Albertsons was built, they would all eventually be removed in the late 2010's when that old bank at the bottom right was demolished to make way for a large new Cumberland Farms gas station.

     With that, my coverage of Albertsons #4430 is complete. While I dragged everyone to Ross and Burlington today, we'll stay in the area to tour a much more interesting supermarket next time to make up for that. Be sure to come back in two weeks for more!

So until the next post,

The Albertsons Florida Blogger

Former Albertsons #4332 - Coral Springs, FL (North University Drive)

 

Albertsons #4332 / Publix #1311

2201 North University Drive, Coral Springs, FL

     It's been two months since we toured our last Publixsons, so we're a bit overdue for another one, right? To calm your Publixsons withdrawal, we're off to South Florida today for a look at another one of these Floridian supermarket anomalies. The store we'll be touring today has a decent balance of Albertsons relics and modern Publix upgrades, and is a nice example of how one of these 1970's Albertsons stores can be cleaned up in the modern day (without the use of a wrecking ball - we all know how much Publix likes to send those out for some of their renovation needs!). So let's jump right into this tour and see what this store is all about:

     Coral Springs is a northwestern suburb of Fort Lauderdale, and one of the many suburban communities to pop up in western Broward County during the construction boom of the 1960's and 1970's. Opening in 1979, Albertsons #4332 would end up becoming the first of three Albertsons stores to call Coral Springs home, the other two stores (#4430 and #4449) opening in the mid-late 1990's as the city began to build out. Coral Springs is considered one of the nicer suburbs of Fort Lauderdale, so it's no surprise Albertsons wanted to have a decent presence in this part of Broward County. While the two later stores were built further toward the edges of town, Albertsons #4332 established itself in the heart of Coral Springs' business district, only a mile and a half north of the busy Coral Square Mall (which to this day is the primary mall serving northwestern Broward County).

     While Albertsons did manage to get their store count up to 3 in Coral Springs by the turn of the 2000's, the original #4332 continued to be the best performer of the bunch. #4430 on the eastern edge of town ended up converting into a Super Saver in 2005 (and closing shortly after), while #4449 on the northern side of town crashed and burned after only a handful of years in business. We'll talk more about those other two stores another day, but needless to say, those two stores could never match the performance of the town's original location, which was sold to Publix in 2008 as part of the 49 Floridian Albertsons stores Publix bought that year.

     Albertsons left this store in mostly original form until the 2002-2003 timeframe, at which time the exterior modification we see here were made. Albertsons consolidated the main entrance to the right side of the building, closing in the original doors and windows along the front of the building (which would have looked like this). A few Floridian Albertsons stores received similar exterior remodels like #4332's around the same time, which usually included an interior refresh to the Broadway/Industrial Circus decor as well (like we saw at store #4328 in Lake Worth).

     Even though a lot of the exterior was stuccoed over in the early 2000's refresh, a number of original elements (like some river rock panels) managed to remain. Some original panels are visible in the above photo (now painted blue by Publix), and a few photos back you can see more original panels to the left of the main entrance.

     I don't have an exact opening date for this Publix, but based off when the store's liquor license was issued, Publix #1311 opened sometime in mid-2009. Publix #1311 would serve as a replacement for Publix #341, located a mile to the west of here (and which you can tour here, as part of a bonus MFR post to go along with this one). Publix left much of the exterior alone when they moved in, only repainting the exterior to a brown color scheme from Albertsons' original tan. The blue paint job happened sometime in 2020 or 2021, a much more recent addition.

     Albertsons built a small cart corral to the right of the main entrance. With the way Albertsons reconfigured the entryway in the early 2000's, the entrance dumps shoppers right into the salesfloor next to the deli (without any kind of vestibule, which is why all the carts ended up out here).

     The entrance in view, let's head inside and see what that Publixsons is all about:

     Stepping through those doors, you find the deli immediately to your right, and the service desk (which we'll see a little later) in an island to your left.

     Next to the deli is the bakery, located along the right side wall.

     When Albertsons remodeled this store in the early 2000's, they left the store's original 1970's Skaggs layout mostly in-tact. These stores had the deli and bakery in the front right corner like you see here, with produce behind me. Albertsons' remodel would have been mostly a decor swap on the interior, with the biggest modification being the relocation of the pharmacy to the front right corner of the building from the back of the store.

     While the layout is original to Albertsons, Publix did heavily modify all the service departments to their liking. When Publix first opened, this store would have gotten Classy Market 2.0, a more thorough remodel to that package considering all the modifications made to the building to make it more Publix-like. The current Classy Market 3.0/Sienna decor appears to have been a quick refresh from the mid 2010's, installed over all the original CM 2.0 modifications. 

     Turning around from our view in those last few photos, here's a look into the produce department (with floral poking out from the left side of the image).

     Produce is located in the back right corner of the building, the standard placement for it in one of these 1970's era Albertsons stores.

     Moving along to the back wall, we find the meat department, with the service counter off in the distance where the wall color switches back to green. Sadly, in many of these Publixsons stores (especially in these 1970's era buildings), CM 3.0 comes off as pretty blah. Unlike CM 2.5 (which had some decorative wall props to fill the blank space with), CM 3.0 never had any of that, leaving us with all this blank wall space.

     We'll return to the store's back wall in a little bit for a closer look at the meat/seafood service counter, but for now, we'll loop back through the grocery aisles as we meander our way to the other side of the store.

     This Publixsons store has the split-aisle set-up, like many other Publixsons stores. The main grocery aisles are set behind a row of shorter aisles, creating a dual front actionway of sorts. The main aisles are the numbered ones seen to my right, with the shorter ones being the unnumbered ones to my left.

     Cutting through one of the short aisles, here's a look across the building's front end. The service desk is located under the lower ceiling to my left, with the check lanes beyond that.

     The first few short aisles in this store are home to wine, and then switch to more non-food items and eventually health and beauty the further to the left you go. The above photo looks out from one of the wine aisles into aisle 3, home to baking supplies and condiments.

     In what I've seen in photos of Publix stores from the 1980's, Publix used to use a split-aisle setup in most of their stores, cutting the aisles in half right down the middle. It seems by the 1990's that arrangement went away, with Publix opting to create single, longer aisles. These Publixsons stores (and two Pub-Dixies I've been to) are the only ones I've seen with any kind of split aisle arrangement in modern times, and it's always the short-aisle, long-aisle arrangement like we have here. I guess Publix just finds these building too deep for their taste!

     Here's a closer look at the front end as we approach the check lanes. The self-checkout stations are a recent addition, as those have only begun to appear in Floridian Publix stores over in the last few years (even though Publix has used self-checkout in stores outside of Florida since the mid-2000's). Usually the self-checkouts are added when a store remodels to Evergreen, but I have seen them added in some late era CM 3.0/Sienna remodels as well.

     Reaching the center of the store, we find frozen foods. Frozen foods occupy two aisles in this store, this being the first of them.

     Peeking out from frozen foods, here's a look at the meat and seafood service counter. The tile backsplash you see in this department is from the Classy Market 2.5 remodel, which used the most creative tile patterns I've ever seen come out of Publix (for example, the backsplash here is supposed to look like bubbles in the water). The current CM 3.0 signage above the department looks rather plain without any of the usual accent this decor would get in a new-build Publix. CM 2.5 also used blue paint for the background of the Seafood department too, which matched the tile pattern much better.

     Next to Seafood we find the signage for meats, located over the coolers. Publix decided to install an "accent bar" (I can't think of a better name for it) over the 'Meats' sign, which broke up some of the blankness on the wall over there!

     After seafood the back wall transitions into dairy, which wraps around the side of the building into the last grocery aisle. Albertsons' pharmacy (up to the early 2000's remodel) would have been located in the area where the dairy back wall is now.

     Returning to the grocery aisles, we find ourselves in the second frozen food aisle, aisle 6. From this perspective, you could probably convince yourself this photo was taken in a building built by Publix - the coolers are the usual Publix style, the old Albertsons flooring was replaced with a faux terrazzo (which looks a lot nicer than any tile pattern Publix would have used), and the lighting was upgraded to Publix's usual square style from Albertsons' old fluorescent tubes. Publix put a lot of work into this old Albertsons to make it feel like a Publix, which hopefully means this building will get to stick around a lot longer than some of the old Albertsons buildings Publix has hardly done anything with over the years.

     Following frozen foods, aisle 7 is home to the beer coolers and chips (your one stop back to college shop) - a combination that could not have been any more perfect!

     Getting closer to the left side of the store, the short aisles to my left begin to transition into health and beauty products (the pharmacy counter is just out of frame to my left). The last few grocery aisles to my right begin to switch over to non-foods as well, containing pet food, cleaning supplies, and paper products.

     However, before switching over to the non-foods, I have this photo looking down aisle 8, home to popcorn, crackers, and other snacks.

     Pet supplies in aisle 10.

     The front left corner of the building is home to the pharmacy counter, which we can see here. The pharmacy was also overhauled by Publix into their standard design, which is quite fancy for a supermarket pharmacy! Albertsons moved the pharmacy counter here from the back of the store in the early 2000's remodel. Moving the pharmacy to this part of the building was common for Albertsons to do in the late 90's/early 2000's. More elaborate remodels usually rebuilt this part of the store to include a large pharmacy counter and a new liquor store, coming at the expense of the side entrance these 1970's stores were built with. Since this was a more budget-minded remodel for Albertsons, the pharmacy was moved up here with the original liquor store and side entrance left in-tact, which we'll see in a moment.

     Dairy takes up the entirety of the left side wall of the store, even stretching into the pharmacy area like we see here. The set-up seems odd, however, maybe it's not too bad of an idea to keep the tubs of spicy jalapeno cheese dip across from the bottles of Tums...

     From the pharmacy counter, here's a look across the front of the store once again.

     Albertsons would have originally had the service desk located along the front wall in front of the check lanes, however Publix moved the service desk into their usual island arrangement like most modern Publix stores have. 

     That group of people block it, but behind them and the pharmacy counter, you can see the side entrance. While it wasn't in use when I was here, Publix does have a small staffed express lane next to the side entrance too. We're going to exit through the side door, and take a look at the liquor store while we're over there:

     While the side entrance makes for a convenient access to the pharmacy, Publix only signs the side entrance as the home of the liquor store. The entrance to the liquor store is located behind the left column, somewhat hidden in the corner.

     Albertsons redid the side entrance facade in the early 2000's remodel too, but otherwise left this side of the building mostly original.

     Publix did a good job modernizing this over 40 year old building for their needs, and hopefully Publix gets a lot more time out of this building too. While the interior has its quirks from being an Albertsons in the past, it feels much more like a Publix inside this store than some other Publixsons I've been to. The exterior though, that's still 100% Albertsons in every way!

     Now that we've finished our tour of the store, let's begin with out aerial imagery, starting with the usual Bird's Eye views from Bing Maps:

Front - these images were taken in the building's brown painted days

Right Side

Back

Left Side

     And the historic aerial imagery, courtesy of Google Earth and historicaerials.com:

Former Albertsons #4332 - 2022

Former Albertsons #4332 - 2010

Former Albertsons #4332 - 2008 - The building is empty here, awaiting Publix's arrival.

Albertsons #4332 - 2006

Albertsons #4332 - 2002 - You can see the building in its original, unaltered form here, as the remodel had yet to begin.

Albertsons #4332 - 1995

Albertsons #4332 - 1980 - The store was only a year old here.

Future Albertsons #4332 - 1969 - The roads were just beginning to be built at this time.

     As I mentioned earlier in this post, the Publix we just toured above replaced an older store about a mile to the west of here. So as a bonus, we'll also be exploring the original Publix store on MFR today too! Above you can see what the original store looks like in the present, but to see more, be sure to check out my additional coverage on MFR here!

     So that's all I have for this post. If you want to read more be sure to check out my coverage of the former Publix over on MFR, otherwise be sure to come back in two weeks for more Albertsons!

Until the next post,

The Albertsons Florida Blogger