Editor’s Note: Today’s post is a guest submission from HHR’s good friend Anonymous in Houston
Happy new year, Houston Historic Retail readers! Today’s topic is a bit of a random retail post. Those of you familiar with my guest blog posts here at HHR know that while I enjoy discussing retail history, I am not much of a retail photographer. The wonderful retail photographers out there deserve a lot of credit for their skill in discreetly photographing stores without setting off alarms with store/mall security and without taking a bunch of blurry photos of one’s feet and thumbs. I know that the retail photographers out there reading this post could write books about their experiences taking photos in stores, but retail photography isn’t something I feel that I am particularly skilled in so I stick to words while letting the professionals like Mike handle the photography. Clearly, my new year’s resolution won’t be measured in megapixels!
That said, as an avid retail blog reader and Flickr viewer, there was a time long ago when I lightly wondered if I was Flickr material myself. Around a decade ago, I did take some retail photos. However, it was almost exactly a decade ago that Albertsons Florida Blog started his famous retail blog, an event which was recently celebrated, and it was exactly a decade ago this month that AFB started his Flickr account. Towards the end of 2014, Retail Retell of the Mid-South Retail Blog started his own Flickr account. Given the high quality of the then-new generation of Flickr retail photographers in 2014, I elected to keep my meager retail photography collection private.
However, after recently finding some of my archived files, I decided that it would be interesting to post some of my retail photos from around January 2014 as a retrospective look at some Houston retail from a decade ago which is either gone now or significantly changed.
Almeda Mall – January 2014
The Piccadilly Cafeteria entrance was just inside the mall entrance door on the right. It is just barely visible in this angle, but Piccadilly had a banner advertising a special to the left of the mall entrance doors. These mall entrances were redesigned a few years before 2014 and then redesigned again when the mall was renovated to something more modern to match the mall’s new interior design. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The earthtone look of Almeda Mall was really dated looking by 2014. In fact, it was dated looking even in 1994 which is why Almeda Mall’s twin mall, Northwest Mall, got an extensive redesign long before Almeda Mall did even though Almeda ultimately proved to be the more successful mall. It is only barely visible here, but there is some mismatched brown tiles indicating where the fountain used to be before it was dismantled. Also, as you can see, Burlington didn’t use the entire old JCPenney mall entrance. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
This isn’t the greatest quality photo out there, but the spotlights on the palm trees are a nice touch. The Almeda Mall Macy’s has not changed much since 2014. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
In 2014, Almeda Mall was owned by Fox Properties, but in recent years, the mall has changed hands a couple of times. Kohan took over the mall a few years ago, but recently Mike discovered that a company named 4th Dimension Properties, a company from Florida which also owns the Central Mall in Port Arthur, TX and the Central Mall in Texarkana, owns the mall now. Hopefully the new owner will be able to redevelop the JCPenney/Burlington anchor spot.
Garden Oaks Sears on N. Shepherd – January 2014
This may not be the greatest photo ever taken of the Garden Oaks Sears sign, but I’m glad to have at least one photo of that glowing sign in my retail photo collection! Some of you may remember January 24, 2014 as being the morning that we had freezing rain in the morning which caused quite a mess on the roads in North Houston at least. By the time this photo was taken in the evening, it was just cold instead of being icy cold. There’s nothing like a little Sears neon to warm things up! (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
There is only one photo here, but it is a photo from what once was one of Houston’s most photogenic retail spots, the N. Shepherd Sears store. This Sears opened in 1950 and was one of the last Houston Sears full-line stores to remain open when it closed towards the end of 2020. Recent news came out about the Sears building being demolished to make room for a mixed-use redevelopment. Je of the Louisiana & Texas Retail Blog extensively covered the N. Shepherd Sears in 2015 and in 2020.
The permanent closure, or so we thought, of the Mall of the Mainland – January & Early February 2014
Finally, we’ll look at what was supposed to be the last few days of Texas City’s Mall of the Mainland in January and very early February 2014. After struggling since the mall opened in 1991, Mall of the Mainland management announced on December 9, 2013 that they were finally throwing in the towel and they said they would close the mall by the end of January 2014. The Mall of the Mainland was at one time one of the US’s most famous dead malls after it was lampooned on the now-dead Labelscar website in 2007. While dead/dying malls were hardly uncommon in the late 2000s and 2010s, few of them were born losers like the Mall of the Mainland was and few of them tried to hoodwink shoppers into making the mall look successful when it clearly wasn’t given the painted-up fake storefronts at the mall and the painted-up postcard from Gloria to Nikki talking about how much there is to do at the Mall of the Mainland.
I followed the closure of the Mall of the Mainland with high interest given the fame of the place and I visited the mall several times during the mall’s final few months. The photos seen below came from those several visits. Also, I purchased two issues of the Galveston County Daily News newspaper from December 10, 2013 (when the mall closure announcement was made) and from January 30, 2014 (the official closing date for the mall). I still have those ‘commemorative’ newspapers in my collection and so I have photographed the mall articles from those newspapers as well.
As I mentioned in a guest blog post here at HHR in 2022, although the mall did close in 2014 except for the remaining anchors at the time, Sears, Cinemark Movies 12, and Palais Royal, the mall property was eventually sold at a bargain basement price and the new owner re-developed and partially re-opened the mall as the Mainland City Centre. It is really remarkable that here a decade later, someone was able to turn the property into a semi-viable space. The Mainland City Centre remains a work-in-progress, but it is hardly the most distressed Houston area mall/former mall property here in 2024. Je of the Louisiana & Texas Retail Blog has an excellent and very comprehensive post memorializing the 1991-2014 version of the Mall of the Mainland. Also, Pseudo3D of Carbon-izer has a blog post chronicling his visit to the mall in 2008.
First, here are the photos of the Galveston County Daily News articles about the Mall of the Mainland. The first two are from December 10, 2013 and the last two are from January 30, 2014. It should be noted that these two newspapers were both purchased from a newspaper vending machine located in the Mall of the Mainland Sears parking lot:
Here is the headline from Dec. 10, 2013 announcing the news that the Mall of the Mainland would close in January 2014. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here is more information about the mall’s closure from the December 10, 2013 Galveston Daily News. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here is the Galveston Daily News headline from January 30, 2014 announcing that the Mall of the Mainland was finished…or so we thought. The buckets on the floor in the headline photo might indicate that the mall was in poor physical condition when it closed. While it did have some roof leaks, it wasn’t as bad as older malls with deferred maintenance such as Greenspoint Mall. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here’s some more information about what everyone assumed was the end of the Mall of the Mainland. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Mall photos from January 13, 2014:
We’re now stepping inside the Mall of the Mainland on January 13, 2014. The Christmas decorations were put away for the mall’s final few weeks. Photographing this mall was super easy during all my visits since there were no shoppers in the mall corridors and even the people working the kiosks and in-line shops were starting to close up operations. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
I believe the Hello Josephine deli was still open when this photo was taken, but obviously the food court was completely devoid of visitors. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
In the last few months before the mall closed in 2014, the eastern half of the mall located beyond the food court was walled off so only about half of the mall was still open during that time. This food court section of the mall has been re-opened in the Mainland City Centre re-development. The mall’s ‘Restaurant Row’ is located in this part of the building and some of the eateries even use the mall’s old food court stalls. Otherwise, this space was completely remodeled for the Restaurant Row. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The Mall of the Mainland famously painted up fake storefronts in places where in-line tenants never opened. The closed Foley’s/Macy’s anchor is off to the left. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The infamous postcard on the wall where stores never opened at the Mall of the Mainland. Nikki’s address and hometown is completely made up, but it is interesting to note that 77060 is Greenspoint Mall’s Zip code. Perhaps at the time this post card was painted, the Mall of the Mainland did have more worthwhile shopping and entertainment options than Greenspoint Mall. That’s not saying much though. I will say that shopping at the Mall of the Mainland was a vacation if you wanted to spend time in a public space and didn’t want to see anyone else! It was paradise for those who wanted peace and quiet. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here’s an image from the busiest part of the mall, relatively speaking, near the Sears. The Affordable Furniture on the left was still open when this photo was taken, but I believe they were in the process of closing. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The Mall of the Mainland Sears location was just a single level store, but they packed a lot of stuff into this smaller location and it was quite neatly organized. Unfortunately, the Sears closed in 2019 and the building now hosts a very busy and large World Gym location. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The mall entrance corridor near Sears had many outdated movie posters for the then still-operating Cinemark Movies 12. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here’s some obvious Macy’s labelscar. This ex-Foley’s building later housed a World Gym location, before they moved to the Sears building, and Palais Royal moved to this building from their in-line mall location. However, after Palais Royal went out of business in 2020, the building was converted into a cosmetology school for the local community college. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
These signs are still around, but now they say Mainland City Centre. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Mall photos from January 21, 2014:
The Mall of the Mainland was a great place to take a vacation from shopping! (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Here is the outside of the Affordable Furniture near the Sears. I don’t know how obvious this is in the photo, but the paint on these architectural features was in really sad shape in 2014. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The parking lot was also in really bad shape in 2014! This was the main entrance for the Sears store. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Mall photos from January 27, 2014:
We’re now looking at the east end of the mall. This part of the mall was already closed by 2014 and the Dillard’s anchor to the right and the JCPenney anchor to the left had been closed for a number of years already. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
There is the JCPenney anchor with the reddish-brown bricks over on the left. The JCPenney is now a self-storage facility. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The Dillard’s is currently a church. The mall corridor between the JCPenney and Dillard’s was turned into an Altitude Trampoline Park, but it appears Altitude may have closed in 2023. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
Mall photos from February 3, 2014. It should be noted that although the mall technically closed at the end of January 2014, the mall kept this mall entrance open so people could access the mall entrance to the Sears. Not long after this photo was taken, Sears permanently closed their mall entrance and the mall also closed this corridor:
The Mall of the Mainland was supposed to be closed by February, but we can see they left the lights on for us! Well, one light at least. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
The mall made a makeshift barricade using the mall’s planters. The only thing you could access from the mall entrance was the Sears. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
I’m not really sure why the mall kept this entrance open even after the mall had officially closed since it was perfectly possible to shop at the Sears without going through the mall, but I’m not complaining that we got a few extra days of at least a little bit of the mall being open. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
It should be said that even in the mall’s final weeks, the cleanliness inside the mall was maintained quite well. That said, at least during the summer of 2013, the mall was not air conditioned very effectively. I can’t remember if the heater was running when these photos were taken. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
This is our final look inside the Mall of the Mainland before the redevelopment. (From the Anonymous in Houston retail photo collection)
In conclusion, it is interesting to look back at these retail photos from exactly a decade ago. Almeda Mall is still alive and mostly well, but it certainly looks more modern now than it did in 2014 when it was still a retro time capsule. The Mall of the Mainland shockingly found a second life, but I’m glad I was able to chronicle some history from the mall’s colorful first life. Due to the redevelopment, most of the mall aspects in the photos are either significantly remodeled, no longer around, or are inaccessible to the public. Finally, it is always great to see that glowing Garden Oaks Sears sign! If you have any thoughts or comments about the places discussed in this post, feel free to leave a comment below. We love to hear from our readers!
Wow, I agree with Retail Retell that I never knew you had a knack for retail photography! Saying that my retail photos are “great” is an extreme compliment because the photographer in me cringes at the sight of many of them. I just wish I could walk around with my DSLR and have a space as empty as the Mall of the Mainland to photograph!
Neat stuff, and that 1950’s Sears sign was very cool to see! I hope you end up uncovering more shots from your archives!
Ha, the Mall of the Mainland was most certainly empty enough for DSLR photography! You might have been able to set up a drone to photograph in that mall and not caught anyone’s attention! These days, Macroplaza Mall in Pasadena (Houston) is probably about as empty as the Mall of the Mainland was a decade ago, but it is not as photogenic as the Mall of the Mainland.
As far as photos taken discreetly with a smartphone, I think you and the others I mentioned have come as close as possible to perfecting the art of retail photography! That said, since you do take photos with a DSLR, I’m sure photos coming from a phone will always seem a bit lacking, but I guess slightly lacking photos is better than dealing with store security!
I don’t know what’s more shocking, that Anonymous in Houston has a secret collection of retail photos, or that 2014 was a decade ago! Either way, really great post here! I very much appreciate all the compliments and links as well, although if you are using me as part of the standard for “excellent” retail photography, then we are all doomed XD Your photos are great and while I certainly respect your decision to focus only on writing these days, it seems like you have a knack for the photography part as well! Even so, looking forward to more posts written by you in the year ahead 🙂
Thanks! Some of my old retail photos are so secret that I don’t even know where they are now! They were on old phones and I don’t know where I backed up all those photos. I’ll post them if I can find them. Some of these photos, especially the ones from the Mall of the Mainland, turned out pretty well for photos from an early smartphone…and not even a higher-end one at that!
I think it is fair to say that you are the most prominent supermarket photographer on Flickr these days and I’m sure the newer uploaders on Flickr look to your channel for inspiration. With that, I think it is fair to say your photos are the standard for excellence! Mike, AFB, NW Retail, Je, and Sing Oil all take great photos as well, but at least these days, all their photos go on their blogs and not Flickr AFAIK. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that!
The Mall of the Mainland was such a hot topic in the Houston retail community in 2013-4 that I thought it was worth reflecting upon that excitement a decade ago especially since it seems so distant now. Some of the newer members of the retail enthusiast community may not even remember or know about periods of excitement in the community. I remember all the excitement on Flickr around the same time about the Bauhaus Stateline Rd. Kroger in your part of the world so it is interesting to think about those exciting times in the retail blog/photostream world.
The Two Way Roads post is outdated…I didn’t even realize it was still up. (It was meant to be temporary).
New link: http://www.carbon-izer.com/photoessay/motm/motm.html
Wow, I agree with Retail Retell that I never knew you had a knack for retail photography! Saying that my retail photos are “great” is an extreme compliment because the photographer in me cringes at the sight of many of them. I just wish I could walk around with my DSLR and have a space as empty as the Mall of the Mainland to photograph!
Neat stuff, and that 1950’s Sears sign was very cool to see! I hope you end up uncovering more shots from your archives!
Ha, the Mall of the Mainland was most certainly empty enough for DSLR photography! You might have been able to set up a drone to photograph in that mall and not caught anyone’s attention! These days, Macroplaza Mall in Pasadena (Houston) is probably about as empty as the Mall of the Mainland was a decade ago, but it is not as photogenic as the Mall of the Mainland.
As far as photos taken discreetly with a smartphone, I think you and the others I mentioned have come as close as possible to perfecting the art of retail photography! That said, since you do take photos with a DSLR, I’m sure photos coming from a phone will always seem a bit lacking, but I guess slightly lacking photos is better than dealing with store security!
Thank you for your kind words! I’d also agree that lacking photos are much better than dealing with store security!
I don’t know what’s more shocking, that Anonymous in Houston has a secret collection of retail photos, or that 2014 was a decade ago! Either way, really great post here! I very much appreciate all the compliments and links as well, although if you are using me as part of the standard for “excellent” retail photography, then we are all doomed XD Your photos are great and while I certainly respect your decision to focus only on writing these days, it seems like you have a knack for the photography part as well! Even so, looking forward to more posts written by you in the year ahead 🙂
Thanks! Some of my old retail photos are so secret that I don’t even know where they are now! They were on old phones and I don’t know where I backed up all those photos. I’ll post them if I can find them. Some of these photos, especially the ones from the Mall of the Mainland, turned out pretty well for photos from an early smartphone…and not even a higher-end one at that!
I think it is fair to say that you are the most prominent supermarket photographer on Flickr these days and I’m sure the newer uploaders on Flickr look to your channel for inspiration. With that, I think it is fair to say your photos are the standard for excellence! Mike, AFB, NW Retail, Je, and Sing Oil all take great photos as well, but at least these days, all their photos go on their blogs and not Flickr AFAIK. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that!
The Mall of the Mainland was such a hot topic in the Houston retail community in 2013-4 that I thought it was worth reflecting upon that excitement a decade ago especially since it seems so distant now. Some of the newer members of the retail enthusiast community may not even remember or know about periods of excitement in the community. I remember all the excitement on Flickr around the same time about the Bauhaus Stateline Rd. Kroger in your part of the world so it is interesting to think about those exciting times in the retail blog/photostream world.