Howdy folks, and welcome to another Permit Roundup! Unfortunately, last week, I ran out of time before I was able to complete the post, and it looks like I’m going to run into a similar issue again this week. While I won’t have time to write a full article, I do still have time to pull the data needed. I’m also included the interesting pieces that were skipped last week. I’m unfortunately going to be …
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Happy 40th Anniversary, Willowbrook Mall!
Editor’s Note: Today we begin Houston Historic Retail’s Month of Malls! Our 3 Wednesday posts will feature all new Mall content! Lets start off Part One with Northwestern Houston Resident Expert Anonymous in Houston! -Mike Those who have visited the Willowbrook Mall area in Northwest Houston know that several words can be used to describe the territory, but ‘sleepy’ is probably not one of them in current times. However, prior to the official opening of …
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Permit Roundup: Another 7-Eleven, Another Village Medical, and Victoria’s Secret Memorial City Mall gets a makeover
Howdy folks, prepare for a short Permit Roundup this week, while we do have a good cross-section of retail represented, this was a slow week for permitting in the city, likely somewhat due to the uncertainty of Hurricane Ida. So let’s keep our thoughts with our neighbors to the East this morning and throughout the coming weeks. Let’s start off with the good stuff, Walgreens at 2221 Fulton appears to be starting on an earlier …
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My Summer Vacation: A CVS on the Riverwalk
In 1993 Eckerd opened a new drug store at 211 Loyosa San Antonio, with an entrance on the Riverwalk, this location is now arguable “One of the best known CVS locations in Texas”. With the CVS acquisition of Eckerd in Texas (and a few other places), the store changed names and continues to operate as a bit of an oddity. Let’s start off with the history of the building. Built sometime in the mid 1800s, …
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Random Retail: Two out of place Big Box Retailers, and Two former Burger Joints
Welcome folks, today we’ve got another edition of Random Retail! This week we have a heavy emphasis on a former Wal-Mart, but not enough that it warrants its own post. If you’ve never experienced Random Retail before, well it’s basically a dump of photos I’ve taken that don’t really fit in with anything else I’m doing at the moment. A good portion of these Random Retail photos come from former Wal-Mart #597 at 7075 FM …
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Retail News: Foodarama sells another former Safeway, and Village Medical comes closer to achieving goal
Foodarama Sells Another Former Safeway According to the Houston Chronicle, property developer Baker Katz has acquired the former Safeway at 1805 Ella Boulevard, which is currently occupied by Cox’s Foodarama. The building was originally constructed as two separate structures, with Safeway forming the right side, and Eckerd forming the left. (Shout out to Anonymous in Houston for figuring that one out!) As such, the two properties were under separate ownership and have remained as such …
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Exploring Vintage Ads: AIMing For The Best
Editor’s Note: Today’s post is a guest submission from HHR’s good friend Anonymous in Houston We aim to give you, the loyal reader, nothing but the very best content here at the Houston Historic Retail blog. With that in mind, here is the first entry in what could well be a new series where we will explore some vintage retail ads that are interesting and perhaps even relevant to Houston retail history. I thought it …
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Through the Annals: A Guide to Retail History in Annual Reports
Editor’s Note: Today’s post is a guest submission from HHR’s good friend Anonymous in Houston Researching the operations of a publicly traded company here in the 21st century is most certainly not a very difficult thing. After all, there are numerous reports about companies available through their own websites and through various websites that can all be accessed very quickly. However, those who were around before the rise of the World Wide Web might remember …
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CVS abandons an Eckerd’s concept
Welcome back loyal reader in this week’s post we’re talking about a CVS location that started out life as Eckerd. Most Houstonians can recall when Eckerd went away and CVS debuted in Houston. Many within our fair city thought that this was a long planned transition and a national phasing out of the chain. It at least seemed that way from the customer point of view. Based on the statements CVS was making it seemed …
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Whos been painting Eckerd?
Remember Eckerd? Sure you do, it was the second largest pharmacy chain in the United States at one point! And its blue and white color scheme with purple, red, and gold accents are peak “90s aesthetic”. Even if you’re not familiar with the store, you’e likely to agree they looked awesome! Eckerd stores looked nice, had locations nearly from coast to coast and were all unfortunately doomed. This was largely due to the 1996 merger …
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