Category: Grocery

Posts Relating to Grocery Stores

Retail News: Randall’s in Sugar Land prepares to close as Sam’s Club in West Houston prepares to reopen

Edit: 5/3 Interested in following the status of the remaining Randall’s in Houston, then consider following Houston Historic Retail on Facebook or subscribe via email for updates! Welcome back to Houston Historic Retail, for another Retail News brief! This week we have some bad news for Randall’s fans and some good news for bulk shoppers on the West Side. Randall’s in Sugar Land prepares to close The headline this week is the announcement that Albertsons …

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From far away this doesn't look much like a Randall's anymore, but the closer you get...

A Spec’s in a former Randall’s? Robert Onstead must be rolling in his grave!

Howdy, and welcome back to HHR! Today we’re taking a look at one of the most scandalous grocery store conversions to take place. This former Randall’s has been divided into thirds, with Aldi, Planet Fitness, and Spec’s splitting up the building. The store at 3126 FM 528 Rd, Friendswood, TX 77546, opened as part of Randall’s 80s push. Which brought stores from the Westside back down to South Houston, where Robert Onstead had been introduced …

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The Half Price Books in North Oaks Mall, about a month ago

Retail News: North Oaks Mall loses Half Price Books, but we gain Gordon Food Service stores in Houston

Howdy folks, and welcome back to Houston Historic Retail. Today we have a brief news check-in! North Oaks Mall loses Half Price books, but re-signs Big Lots North Oaks Mall was recently put up for auction by the property owners. The former mall, now a shopping center, once housed interior corridors, and a larger number of shops. These days however, the tenant list is dwindling as more and more make their exit from North Oaks. …

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Welcome To Tomball! (Captured with permission from Dan Starr)

A Tour of Tomball Retail in 1998

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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The Kitchen United store front took up far more space than I thought it would.

Fuddruckers goes Krogering, Trying out Kroger’s new ghost kitchen

Howdy folks, and welcome back to Houston Historic Retail! When I started out this blog, I had one intention, I wanted to cover retail-focused content about my fair Bayou-City. This blog actually started all the way back in 2015. One thing I never had intentions of doing was becoming a food critic. I don’t have the palate or the expressive vocabulary needed to accomplish this I like fast food and small words. That being said, …

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Blue Ridge Blight, a 42 year old Kroger only open for 7, finally has a promising new future

Fort Bend County is not an area one generally associates with urban blight. Most folk’s exposure to the county is driving along the highways, which mostly pass through relatively affluent areas. While there are some pockets, of less valuable properties, it’s nothing compared with what you might see driving the highways of Houston. To most, it would seem that truly decrepit areas don’t exist within the boundaries of Fort Bend, but this is far from …

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The arches accidentally also matched Grand Union's theming, and seems to be why they survived untouched

Weingarten’s Food Fair is over, now it’s Lewis’ Food Town

Weingarten is a grocer I never knew, They were gone by the time I was born but oddly were still held in high regard. The chain folded in 1983, after a buyout in 1979. While many put the blame onto an over-eager chain wanting to expand but incompetent in running stores in unfamiliar territory. While this is partly true, the issue was in fact much broader and stems from a little-known origin story, which is …

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Handy Randalls, the store that killed an HEB still here 50 years later

Howdy, folks, and welcome back to Houston Historic Retail! Today we’re taking an in-depth look at one of Houston’s former Handy Andy stores. If you’re not in the know about Handy Andy, let me give you a little background. They were a grocer based out of San Antonio who expanded to Houston in the 1970s. During the initial phases of their expansion, things went quite well with the Becker family, who owned the stores, building …

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This store featured a 'Grocery Bag' logo with the Sellers Bros bag mascot above the entrance

Sellers Bros C-Stores the only branch left for this Grocery family tree

Howdy retail fans, and welcome! Today I have to start off with some delayed “breaking news” Longtime Houston grocery chain Sellers Bros. has been sold! Yes, it’s true, in a quiet move sometime towards the end of 2019, the Sellers family sold their grocery operations to Rafael Ortega, owner of La Michoacana Markets. As of yet, no public announcement has been made of the sale, however, Sellers Bros offices have closed, and all paperwork refers …

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The arched entrance Randalls is the version I'm most familiar with, using it at their Rosenberg store.

Randallsarama still the nicest grocery store in Inwood

Howdy folks, and welcome back to Houston Historic Retail. If you’re one of our more recent fans and have yet to check out a Randallsarama, consider giving my 2021 visit to one a look. I’ll be making some references to it in this post, and it’s also the birth of the HHR Dictionary, with other entries like Krogerstons popping up more recently. Foodarama is no stranger to former Randall’s locations, they seem to flock to …

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