Editor’s Note: Today’s post is a guest submission from HHR’s good friend Anonymous in Houston Tomball might seem like just another Houston suburb today, but nearly a quarter of a century ago in 1998, Tomball was a bit of a distant place to visit even for those of us like myself who lived in the Northwest Houston suburbs in the Willowbrook Mall area. That said, I did visit Tomball quite frequently in the 1990s and …
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Love thy HEB Neighborhood Market
These days in Houston a vacant grocery store doesn’t tend to sit for too long. While we don’t have a huge number of chains running around town these days to pickup the empty stores, we do have some independents. Even locations that have hit the end of their useful life as grocery stores, are often converted into other types of stores. We’re a town of opportunity, and lax (not non-existent) zoning laws help allow for …
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HEBway a Rare Example in 2021
Howdy folks, welcome back to another edition of Houston Historic Retail. Today we’re taking a look at an HEB at 200 W Hopkins St, San Marcos, TX 78666 that, while not in Houston, was once part of the Houston division of Safeway and AppleTree stores. Located in San Marcos, it lost its Houston affiliation with the 1994 purchase by H-E-B. The store was built in 1984, to replace an older location on the same property. …
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Clear Lake’s HEB in the old Albertsons finally meets its end!
Clear Lake as a city has an interesting history, the 30,000 acres were pieced together by a wealthy businessman to build a ranch on. However, by 1938 the ranch would be sold to Humble Oil company after crude oil fields were found. While Humble began to pump oil from some areas, most of the land sat vacant until 1962, a year after NASA announced plans for the Manned Spacecraft Center. Humble Oil, announced their plans …
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HEB’s Failed Concept store in Northwest Houston
Houston has been a stable market for H-E-B for many years now. While the early years were a bit touch and go at certain times overall HEB could be considered one of the more stable grocers in the Houston area. Even towards the end of the Pantry Foods era, HEB’s success in Houston was measurable. It came to the point where the company felt brave enough to open a “concept store” here in town. Located …
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The one where Safeway and H-E-B made the exact mistake 10 years apart
In late 1982 the Houston Division of Safeway opened a brand-new store to serve the growing Alief, and Mission Bend areas of far West Houston. At the intersection of Bellaire and Synott the modern round edged store opened as the anchor tenant of the shopping center along with an Eckerd. While far from being the last Houston Safeway to open, this would be one of the last built, as most “new” stores going forward would …
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Permit Roundup: New Retail Spaces Appear Throughout Town, Multiple Remodels, and New Restaurants
Welcome back to our second Permit Roundup, this week our post is a bit shorter than last week. It seems similarly to Demolitions Reports, the Residential/Commercial balance changes from week to week, again with an emphasis on the residential permits. Also, if you didn’t read it in yesterday’s demolition post, my server is running very slowly at the moment, but I am in the process of updating, so please bear with me in the meantime. …
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Checking in on Meyerland Plaza
Meyerland Plaza is one of Houston’s oldest continually operating shopping centers. Opening in 1957 as part of the Meyerland Housing Development it underwent an extensive renovation in the early 90s turning it from a more traditional outdoor mall to a department store anchored shopping center. Only a few original tenants managed to survive to the transition. The renovation added new features such as a second story and a new Venture Department Store. The mall has …
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Retail News: Closures and Openings
Welcome back loyal reader to another edition of Random Retail. This one comprises some photos from the past month as today we take a look at openings and closures in the Houston area. Let’s start with the new Meyerland H-E-B. It had its grand opening January 29th, and I was there about three days prior. When Meyerland Plaza opened in 1957, it included a Henke & Pillot grocery store as one of the major tenants. …
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A Haunted H-E-B
I recently had the chance to stop by an H-E-B that I had heard from a friend might be, haunted. I’m not the biggest believer in ghost, ghouls, or goblins. However, I thought it would be fun to stop and take a look. This is the Royal Oaks location 11815 Westheimer Rd, Houston, TX 77077. I wasn’t really expecting to find anything, but boy was I wrong. I stopped by on a chilly night in late …
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