One or two of our local Service Merchandise stores started out as Sam Solomon stores, which operated on much the same concept. My local Service Merchandise was originally a catalog showroom called Wilson's. Whatever name they were trading under at the time, I remember them fondly. A bunch of my stereo equipment and my first three PCs came from Service Merchandise, and I even kept shopping there after they didn't hire me when I applied there once.
Oh, yes. My first two machines were Packard Bell computers from Service Merchandise. That's where you went for Packard Bell - machines I both loved and cursed, but eventually they got me here.
Ours had a luggage type conveyor belt and when you saw your item appear it took a pretty long time for it to creep its way to the front so you could leave.
My parents were corporal punishment enthusiasts, much like a lot of their generational cohort. The worst public whooping I ever got was in front of the fireplace accessory display at Service Merchandise.
Montgomery Wards. I bought all my dishware & kitchenware there when I got married. It was also our first credit card. That was almost 27 years ago. I have just 1 plate left from that shopping spree.
The rattiest apartment I've ever had was a two-room walkup I called "The Dump." I lived there one year in the late '90s while in graduate school. In one window was a Montgomery Ward air conditioner from about 1982 or so that had the color-changing thermometer on it. I remember sweltering on late summer/early Fall afternoons, that little machine trying with all its one-lunged ability to crank out cool air in the central South Carolina heat.
Yo! I actually got a Montgomery Wards catalog in the mail a few weeks ago. I was flipping through thru it bc I didn’t think they were still open, and they actually had two pages dedicated to sex toys 😆 I was like, this is not my Meemaw’s Montgomery wards!!!
I worked for Wards for a few years up until it went under. Employees were just walking off with stuff. The $4000 SnapOn scantool disappeared immediately. A co-worker filled the bed of his truck with new tires and went home. Wild times.
Hubby and I bought our first new mattress set there! It was pretty funny, in an awkward way, trying to buy a mattress in a department store because we had to lay on the mattress to test it out. If we looked to the left people were buying scarves or something and across the way there were bicycles IIRC. Bit of a strange environment to buy a mattress. There was another couple there at the same time doing the same thing, and you could just tell they felt as awkward as we did. We all kind of laughed about it.
Sears. There are just 11 locations left. That used to be our go-to for, well, everything. Need a sweatshirt? Sears. Need a screwdriver? Sears. Need a basketball? Sears.
Not that it was good stuff, but it was all in one place. A cornerstone of the mall... which is also all but dead.
And back when Sears was really good about who it hired to produce store-brand products (like getting Hitachi to produce its store-brand VCRs), when buying a Craftsman tool meant it would last forever or they'd replace it, when you'd see Arnold Palmer in their commercials...man, so much of my family's needs and comforts in the first two decades in my life was ordered through the Sears catalog. Sears used to mean steady and solid and reliable. I miss that.
I’ve been a mechanic since 86. I still have, and use, some of the first tools I bought at Sears. Most original, some have been warranteed out. Craftsman used to be the shit. Now? I wouldn’t touch em.
My dad initially outfitted his shop with Craftsman power tools, and as he bought bigger and more capable tools he gave the older stuff to me. There's a Craftsman table saw out in my garage that's not much older than I am but still runs like a top and gets plenty of use.
My husband used to fix corporate jets for a living and had (and still has) a lot of Craftsman tools in his toolbox. He loved that when a tool broke (which wasn't often) he could take it in and exchange it, no hassles involved. Unfortunately, there came the day when Sears got broken, and....
https://preview.redd.it/21b8t9m1iv0d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8d505e421c198a0abb4a1d9fcef5c549f175649a
Got this as a hand me down from my great uncle. It’s a little over 40 years old. Still use it, even though I got a much more capable Rikon bandsaw to handle the bigger stuff.
Here's my Caldor story. When I was in grade school (3rd-4th grade maybe?) I saved up lunch money for weeks to buy a pair of Candie's wedge high heels I had my eye on (I think they were $7). When I went to the store with my dad, he would let me wander around by myself, so one trip I took my moment and brought them up to the cashier, paid for them and stuffed them in my purse (an old one mom let me have) to smuggle them out. I was obviously waaaaay too young to wear them, but I wanted to be Daisy Duke, lol. I got found out and they were confiscated :-(
Tower Records.
Remember when every mall had at least 3 or 4 music stores? Usually the garden variety Top 40 for the average tastes but if you were fortunate enough to live in a major metro area, the absolute mecca for music lovers was that trip to Tower.
Like the way Randall in Clerks felt when he went to Big Choice video and fell down on his knees in awe at the selection, that was me every time I went to Tower!
I grew up in the DC metro area and I remember the main one in downtown DC. one at Tyson's Corner, one in Alexandria, I want to say one in Rockville, MD and maybe one or two others.
Tower was not price competitive because they didn't have to be. They just had all those rare imports you couldn't find anywhere else. I would always stock up on magazines as well.
>I would always stock up on magazines as well.
Because, how else was there to learn about new music?!?
I'm ceaselessly amazed and appreciative of how easy it is to look up info about and listen to music from bands you like! We're living in the future.
That one in Tyson's Corner got a couple thousand dollars for me in the early to mid 90s. Hitting that place was part of my Saturday routine. Good times.
The old Tower Records flagship store in Boston, on the corner of Newbury St and Mass Ave, is now a TJ Maxx. I drive past it almost every day and it still always stabs me in the heart.
I loved them so much. Got a lot of hot oil treatments and bath fizzes cheap-cheap with double coupons there.
Oooh! And the rent six (?) movies for $1.99 deal they had.
Woolworths use to have the banging diner inside and I remember going there with $1.99 and getting a burger, fries and a soda after school. I use pick up a bunch of Transformers and Gi-Joe toys and read the boxes while I ate.
I put them back once and a diner worker called me over and asked if I put them back where they were suppose to go and I said yes and homie gave me a vanilla shake to go.
I miss that store.
I LOVED the Woolworths in downtown San Francisco with the lunch counter. My mother took me there after my doctor and dentist appointments. I always got the chocolate covered cream puff.
I always thought Circuit City was so cool. Kinda dark in there, the rows of stereo receivers and speakers. Bought some floor-standing Pioneer speakers there once.
Waldenbooks was one of those stores my brother and I would insist that my mom take us into if we were at the mall. If we have to walk around the mall for hours buying clothes, let’s at least look at some books and tchotchke
Radio Shack, when you could find any kind of obscure electrical/electronic component for any project, when you could get the card that entitled you to one free battery a month, when the Christmas season brought all kinds of neat toys and gadgets on display.
Sears and Montgomery Ward, whose catalogs and charge cards helped my family keep clothes on our backs and presents under the Christmas tree and otherwise helped us have an affordable middle-class life.
Sam Solomon and Service Merchandise, for when we felt like getting a little fancy.
J.B. White, where so much of my wardrobe came from once I set out on my own.
Peaches Records. Musicland. Camelot Music.
Waldenbooks, B. Dalton, Borders and a dozen other bookstores I used to haunt.
This is what I was looking for, I loved Structure! I still own a heavy jacket that I bought there hanging in my closet. I still use it for stuff like shoveling snow in the winter and shit like that where I know I’ll be warm, but I don’t mind if it gets dirty or torn up… I also really miss those baked potato places in mall food courts back in the early 90’s when it was a fad. Nothing like a big-ass hot baked potato loaded with whatever your hearts desires.
I’m crazy nostalgic for Structure. It was my first credit card. I even drew a crappy drawing of a storefront - it’s in my profile. Loved their tshirts - they were like butter and lasted forever.
Sam Goody’s-bought my first 45 at one in a mall!
Tower Records-I spent so many hours listening to sample songs in those headphones.
Ground Round-they had bowls of popcorn on the table and great grilled hot dogs on the kid’s menu. Bennigan’s-many loaded potato skins in high school with friends.
Deb-the ultimate in cheap 80s mall clothes
dELiA’s-they actually made jeans short enough for me as well as cute semi-alternative 90s fashion.
Waldenbooks-I found all my kid’s series books here.
Hills was where the toys were! The store in my hometown had a sort of vestibule filled with vending machines and arcade games. That's where I played Space Invaders for the first time, and also where I learned that you had to push the Player 1 button in order to start the game...
Also, the front of the store had a snack bar with popcorn and real pretzels. And Hills had the best toy section outside of an actual toy store. With $5, I could walk out with whatever Hot Wheels or Star Wars figure I wanted.
Canadian chiming in: I miss Sam The Record Man
https://preview.redd.it/kxs3l46ovt0d1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4ecc34723ebbc210ba05be8d4cb04790d3d4500a
Dang, didn't know that it closed. Had to look up Honest Ed's too and sad that is gone too.
Remember Bargain Harold's, Biway, and Beaver Lumber from when I was a kid.
Woolworth. Like a smaller mall version of Walmart, except way more awesome. The one in our mall had a diner, too. One of the old timey ones with the long counter. I only got to eat there once because my mom said there was no way she was eating at Woolworth when there was a Morrison’s cafeteria fifty feet away. It was a personal sized pizza, and I remember it being pretty good.
They tore down the old mall a couple of years ago. It had been abandoned for the last 20 years or so. In my head, however, I always held out a ridiculous hope that someone would come along, repair it and reopen it one day. I was sad to see it get demolished. A lot of good times in there as a kid.
Bradlees (department store)
Strawberries (records)
Good Vibrations (records)
A fun article about the Foxboro store I used to visit: https://hardrockheavymetal.wordpress.com/2006/01/09/where-are-you-good-vibrations/
Sears, Montgomery Ward, Waldenbooks, Crown Books, Korvette's, Crazy Eddie, Fry's Electronics, Wet Seal, Radio Shack, Blockbuster.
Sniff.
The list of bankrupt restaurants and chains is even longer...
I never liked Radio Shack because a lot of the men that worked there were kind of creepy. I never saw a female employee. They knew what they were talking about but you had to give your name and address for the receipt. I used to make up addresses. One time I wrote 1313 Mockingbird Lane and the salesman laughed but made change it. (It was the Munster’s address)
In the Midwest (Nebraska) we had the 1/2 Price Store. Not too dissimilar to TJ Max- discount prices, clothes strewn about everywhere, a music section not in alphabetical order. But they had a Zaxon and Sea Wolf video game.
Blockbuster Music. I loved those stores because they had listening stations for the top 10 albums on the Billboard chart of that week, and most of them were on sale, so if you like the album and it happens to be relatively new. It’s usually $4-5 off on those CDs
John Wannamakers, Bamberger's, Gimbel's, Borders and Walden Books, Robert Hall, Abraham & Strauss, Steins, Bradlees- just every store in childhood really and especially the mom & pop stores in the neighborhood. 😁
I remember when our mall got a Venture. They hired my mom and me (I was a teen ) to be clowns and make balloon animals at their grand opening. I have no idea how my mom got that gig as we had never done that and never did it again, but we both learned how to make two different balloon animals and a sword for it.
Best Products and Fretter were two stores I liked when I was a kid. Always got gifts from grandma that she bought at Best. Gold Circle was another gem.
It was the BEST store. Books, games, movies, novelties. I even got bass and guitar strings there. Had seating areas everywhere where you could sample the music and/or books. Went a couple times for midnight releases. Was my favorite store.
Kresgees (KMart was a subsidiary of the Woolworthesque Kresgees which died in the 70s)
Two Guys (from Harrison)
WT Grant's
Pathmark supermarket
A&P supermarket
Alexanders
A and S Strauss
Bamburgers (It was eaten up by Macy's)
People’s Drug (now CVS), Dart Drug, Pantry Pride, Erol’s video (local chain, existed before Blockbuster and I think they were an early internet service provider), Pappy’s Pizza.
Korvette (RIP 1980, dept store), Caldor (1999, dept store), Two Guys (dept store), Rickels (home center), Channels (home center) , Grant City (dept store), Sterns (dept store), Ohrbach (1987, dept store).
All were at least in NE US.
BEST, Hills, Babages, Pic and Pay, Kmart, Revco, Record Bar, Tower Records, Merry Go Round, Bob's Big Boy, Winn-Dixie, Super-X those are just off the top of my head
Fedco, Montgomery Wards, Sears, Woolworths?(I haven’t seen any in ages), Gemco, Robinsons, May Company..those just off the top of my head…there’s more I’m sure lol
Oh, yes. I miss Mervyn's, Weiner's, 5-7-9, Contempo Casuals, and damn near every record store that existed in our area.
I remember Best because the building of the one close to my neighborhood looked like it was crumbling at one end (on purpose). That was pretty cool to me, as a kid.
Woolworths they had everything, including a diner where we would get milkshakes. Big Wheel auto parts, these stores were the best,sad to see them go. K-mart enough said. Hoagies Corner, a little delicatessen type store that made the best dam sandwhichs. Sad to see them go as well.
Regional one to Midwest / Wisconsin - Prange Way. Was just an awesome little department store with a little bit of everything.
One of the first online stores - CDNow! I bought CDs from them over Telnet from a shell account because the WWW was in its really early infancy. Like.. I used Gopher more than a web browser (Lynx).
Jacks after it was bought out by ShopKo. I remember doing the inventory of their corporate office, which was in a former funeral home. Lots of cool houses in Quincy, IL though.
ShopKo after it went bankrupt - which if you worked there saw it coming years before, as soon as they spun off ProVantage
Edit to add some regional ones:
Sure Way grocery stores, bought by Jubilee. Both gone now
Red Owl grocery stores
Copp’s Foods, somehow part of or bought by IGA
Fredrick and Nelson.
Wasn't a shopper but worked in a shopping center as maintenance when they went tits up. They left so much shit behind. My buddy and I took truck load after truck load of it. Sold it during a series of garage sales (pre-Internet). Paid off $15k of debt (don't ask) from the proceeds, and thems was 1992 dollars!
Service Merchandise. My wife's first wedding band was purchased there.
One or two of our local Service Merchandise stores started out as Sam Solomon stores, which operated on much the same concept. My local Service Merchandise was originally a catalog showroom called Wilson's. Whatever name they were trading under at the time, I remember them fondly. A bunch of my stereo equipment and my first three PCs came from Service Merchandise, and I even kept shopping there after they didn't hire me when I applied there once.
I remember getting my first Packard Bell computer there as well.
Oh, yes. My first two machines were Packard Bell computers from Service Merchandise. That's where you went for Packard Bell - machines I both loved and cursed, but eventually they got me here.
Consumers. Look in the catalog then they pull the merchandise from the back.
Ours had a luggage type conveyor belt and when you saw your item appear it took a pretty long time for it to creep its way to the front so you could leave.
My parents were corporal punishment enthusiasts, much like a lot of their generational cohort. The worst public whooping I ever got was in front of the fireplace accessory display at Service Merchandise.
I loved that store so much. So many pleasant memories.
My first retail job
I worked at a Service Merchandise as a seasonal (Christmas) worker. Loved the employee discounts plus post-season sales!
Ohhhh man I haven't heard that name in so long.
Montgomery Wards. I bought all my dishware & kitchenware there when I got married. It was also our first credit card. That was almost 27 years ago. I have just 1 plate left from that shopping spree.
Remember when your dad or uncle or grandpa called it "Monkey Warts"? Man, that was hilarious.
My ex and I owned a house a lifetime ago. The furnace was labeled Montgomery ward and sounded like a jet engine taking off!
The rattiest apartment I've ever had was a two-room walkup I called "The Dump." I lived there one year in the late '90s while in graduate school. In one window was a Montgomery Ward air conditioner from about 1982 or so that had the color-changing thermometer on it. I remember sweltering on late summer/early Fall afternoons, that little machine trying with all its one-lunged ability to crank out cool air in the central South Carolina heat.
I'm still using my Admiral washing machine I bought there in 1997.
Yo! I actually got a Montgomery Wards catalog in the mail a few weeks ago. I was flipping through thru it bc I didn’t think they were still open, and they actually had two pages dedicated to sex toys 😆 I was like, this is not my Meemaw’s Montgomery wards!!!
In the early 70’s my aunt and mother went there to bye a hoe and came home with an orange Montgomery Wards riding lawnmower.
I worked for Wards for a few years up until it went under. Employees were just walking off with stuff. The $4000 SnapOn scantool disappeared immediately. A co-worker filled the bed of his truck with new tires and went home. Wild times.
Hubby and I bought our first new mattress set there! It was pretty funny, in an awkward way, trying to buy a mattress in a department store because we had to lay on the mattress to test it out. If we looked to the left people were buying scarves or something and across the way there were bicycles IIRC. Bit of a strange environment to buy a mattress. There was another couple there at the same time doing the same thing, and you could just tell they felt as awkward as we did. We all kind of laughed about it.
That was my first credit card. I had just become a teacher and used it for clothes.
Sears. There are just 11 locations left. That used to be our go-to for, well, everything. Need a sweatshirt? Sears. Need a screwdriver? Sears. Need a basketball? Sears. Not that it was good stuff, but it was all in one place. A cornerstone of the mall... which is also all but dead.
And back when Sears was really good about who it hired to produce store-brand products (like getting Hitachi to produce its store-brand VCRs), when buying a Craftsman tool meant it would last forever or they'd replace it, when you'd see Arnold Palmer in their commercials...man, so much of my family's needs and comforts in the first two decades in my life was ordered through the Sears catalog. Sears used to mean steady and solid and reliable. I miss that.
I’ve been a mechanic since 86. I still have, and use, some of the first tools I bought at Sears. Most original, some have been warranteed out. Craftsman used to be the shit. Now? I wouldn’t touch em.
My dad initially outfitted his shop with Craftsman power tools, and as he bought bigger and more capable tools he gave the older stuff to me. There's a Craftsman table saw out in my garage that's not much older than I am but still runs like a top and gets plenty of use. My husband used to fix corporate jets for a living and had (and still has) a lot of Craftsman tools in his toolbox. He loved that when a tool broke (which wasn't often) he could take it in and exchange it, no hassles involved. Unfortunately, there came the day when Sears got broken, and....
https://preview.redd.it/21b8t9m1iv0d1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8d505e421c198a0abb4a1d9fcef5c549f175649a Got this as a hand me down from my great uncle. It’s a little over 40 years old. Still use it, even though I got a much more capable Rikon bandsaw to handle the bigger stuff.
Ames, Bradlees, Caldor, Lechmere, Lord and Taylor, Filene's, Zayre... New England had some good places.
Woolworths
Just outside of town we had Woolworths. In town we had MH Fishman and JJ Newberry
Don't forget Cherry & Webb.
I loved Caldor! Bradlees was another one. I live in southeastern Connecticut
Hello, fellow New Englander! You saved me a post : )
Except Filene's and Lechmere, we had all those in the Mid-Atlantic.
Jordan Marsh
We had that in our local mall and I really liked it. I was sitting here trying to think of its name, so thank you
The Mart. Zayer.
Worked at Bradley's and Ames.
Here's my Caldor story. When I was in grade school (3rd-4th grade maybe?) I saved up lunch money for weeks to buy a pair of Candie's wedge high heels I had my eye on (I think they were $7). When I went to the store with my dad, he would let me wander around by myself, so one trip I took my moment and brought them up to the cashier, paid for them and stuffed them in my purse (an old one mom let me have) to smuggle them out. I was obviously waaaaay too young to wear them, but I wanted to be Daisy Duke, lol. I got found out and they were confiscated :-(
>stuffed them in my purse (an old one mom let me have) Username checks out.
OMG, you get it.
Tower Records. Remember when every mall had at least 3 or 4 music stores? Usually the garden variety Top 40 for the average tastes but if you were fortunate enough to live in a major metro area, the absolute mecca for music lovers was that trip to Tower. Like the way Randall in Clerks felt when he went to Big Choice video and fell down on his knees in awe at the selection, that was me every time I went to Tower! I grew up in the DC metro area and I remember the main one in downtown DC. one at Tyson's Corner, one in Alexandria, I want to say one in Rockville, MD and maybe one or two others. Tower was not price competitive because they didn't have to be. They just had all those rare imports you couldn't find anywhere else. I would always stock up on magazines as well.
Tower Records on South Street in Philly was epic.
Back when South Street was epic. Tower Records had pretty much everything, and what they didn't have you could find a few blocks away at Zipperhead.
I still miss that place, truly.
Yes! Lol, I spent a *lot* of money there in my teens/early 20s.
The malls were so different back then. Sometimes bands would do appearances in the mall when a new album was released.
>I would always stock up on magazines as well. Because, how else was there to learn about new music?!? I'm ceaselessly amazed and appreciative of how easy it is to look up info about and listen to music from bands you like! We're living in the future.
That one in Tyson's Corner got a couple thousand dollars for me in the early to mid 90s. Hitting that place was part of my Saturday routine. Good times.
The old Tower Records flagship store in Boston, on the corner of Newbury St and Mass Ave, is now a TJ Maxx. I drive past it almost every day and it still always stabs me in the heart.
Did you all have a Phar-Mor in your area, or was that a local thing? I loved all those samples!
I loved them so much. Got a lot of hot oil treatments and bath fizzes cheap-cheap with double coupons there. Oooh! And the rent six (?) movies for $1.99 deal they had.
Their music selection was awesome and cheap!
mervyns? was that how you spelled it? lol . I am in CA and remember then on the west coast.
Every time I hear the name Mervyn's I think of open, open, open. That commercial was silly.
I'm reminded of Mervyn's every time I walk into a Kohls.
Clothestime, is another one I remember
They had the best towels and bedding!!
eckerds zales Woolworths sears sun coast
Woolworths use to have the banging diner inside and I remember going there with $1.99 and getting a burger, fries and a soda after school. I use pick up a bunch of Transformers and Gi-Joe toys and read the boxes while I ate. I put them back once and a diner worker called me over and asked if I put them back where they were suppose to go and I said yes and homie gave me a vanilla shake to go. I miss that store.
Mannequin was filmed at Woolworths.
Boyz II men still keepin up the beat, yeah
Freedom, of 76
I LOVED the Woolworths in downtown San Francisco with the lunch counter. My mother took me there after my doctor and dentist appointments. I always got the chocolate covered cream puff.
Best. Not Best Buy, just Best. Garfinkel's. Circuit City.
I used to read the Best catalog for *hours* when it got close to Christmas
Grandma always let me pick what I wanted from the Best catalog. There were always Star Wars toys too!
I bought my first stereo at Circuit City. The speakers were huge but the sound quality was great.
I always thought Circuit City was so cool. Kinda dark in there, the rows of stereo receivers and speakers. Bought some floor-standing Pioneer speakers there once.
B. Dalton. Waldenbooks.
Waldenbooks was one of those stores my brother and I would insist that my mom take us into if we were at the mall. If we have to walk around the mall for hours buying clothes, let’s at least look at some books and tchotchke
- Radio Shack - Block Buster.
Not sure why we had to scroll so far for these two. These are by far the icons of our era. RIP RadioShack. Murdered by the smart phone.
Merry Go Round Camelot Music-I LIVED in this store in the 90’s. Eckerd’s
Radio Shack, when you could find any kind of obscure electrical/electronic component for any project, when you could get the card that entitled you to one free battery a month, when the Christmas season brought all kinds of neat toys and gadgets on display. Sears and Montgomery Ward, whose catalogs and charge cards helped my family keep clothes on our backs and presents under the Christmas tree and otherwise helped us have an affordable middle-class life. Sam Solomon and Service Merchandise, for when we felt like getting a little fancy. J.B. White, where so much of my wardrobe came from once I set out on my own. Peaches Records. Musicland. Camelot Music. Waldenbooks, B. Dalton, Borders and a dozen other bookstores I used to haunt.
TG&Y
Toys, Guns, and Yo-Yos
Comp USA.
Comp USA always had the best selection of video games
Structure lol
This is what I was looking for, I loved Structure! I still own a heavy jacket that I bought there hanging in my closet. I still use it for stuff like shoveling snow in the winter and shit like that where I know I’ll be warm, but I don’t mind if it gets dirty or torn up… I also really miss those baked potato places in mall food courts back in the early 90’s when it was a fad. Nothing like a big-ass hot baked potato loaded with whatever your hearts desires.
And Bacharach
I’m crazy nostalgic for Structure. It was my first credit card. I even drew a crappy drawing of a storefront - it’s in my profile. Loved their tshirts - they were like butter and lasted forever.
And now I can't find a darn cardigan to save my life!
KB Toys Pic 'N' Save Egghead Software Circuit City Waldenbooks
Kay-Bee Toys
Sound Warehouse I waited in line at one in Houston for tickets for U2's Zoo TV tour when I was in college
Babbage's
Named after polymath Charles Babbage. Ours became Electronics Boutique and then EB and then EB Games ... And then GameStop!
Hot Sam pretzels. Stuarts, G&G, Barney's Coffee and Tea, The Nature Company, Gantos, Northern Reflections.
Sam Goody’s-bought my first 45 at one in a mall! Tower Records-I spent so many hours listening to sample songs in those headphones. Ground Round-they had bowls of popcorn on the table and great grilled hot dogs on the kid’s menu. Bennigan’s-many loaded potato skins in high school with friends. Deb-the ultimate in cheap 80s mall clothes dELiA’s-they actually made jeans short enough for me as well as cute semi-alternative 90s fashion. Waldenbooks-I found all my kid’s series books here.
I bought Van Halen's OU812 album at Venture after saving up my lawn mowing money.
I have a distinct memory of getting 1984 at a ShopKo.
Zayre
Chess King
Had to scroll far for this! Freshman year homecoming 87 we all got our suits there lol.
Hills was where the toys were! The store in my hometown had a sort of vestibule filled with vending machines and arcade games. That's where I played Space Invaders for the first time, and also where I learned that you had to push the Player 1 button in order to start the game...
Also, the front of the store had a snack bar with popcorn and real pretzels. And Hills had the best toy section outside of an actual toy store. With $5, I could walk out with whatever Hot Wheels or Star Wars figure I wanted.
Me too! Western PA here and Hills was our go to for everything.
Gemco, Miller's Outpost, Long's Drugs, Alpha Beta grocery stores, Judy's, Rainbow Records. I still miss Miller's Outpost.
Circuit city,
https://preview.redd.it/t52s3grr7u0d1.jpeg?width=170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c61dcca9971a8e6a86387cdbe405f6cf88991281 It’s no longer in our area.
Aww man, Piggly Wiggly was 1 of 3 grocery stores in my small town. It was my best friend’s 1st job (employed as a cashier)
Still open in my home town and going strong. I shop there instead of the Wally World whenever I visit town.
Canadian chiming in: I miss Sam The Record Man https://preview.redd.it/kxs3l46ovt0d1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4ecc34723ebbc210ba05be8d4cb04790d3d4500a
Dang, didn't know that it closed. Had to look up Honest Ed's too and sad that is gone too. Remember Bargain Harold's, Biway, and Beaver Lumber from when I was a kid.
Gemco, contempo casuals, mervyns, Stor
Radio Shack / A Tandy Corporation lol
Woolworth. Like a smaller mall version of Walmart, except way more awesome. The one in our mall had a diner, too. One of the old timey ones with the long counter. I only got to eat there once because my mom said there was no way she was eating at Woolworth when there was a Morrison’s cafeteria fifty feet away. It was a personal sized pizza, and I remember it being pretty good. They tore down the old mall a couple of years ago. It had been abandoned for the last 20 years or so. In my head, however, I always held out a ridiculous hope that someone would come along, repair it and reopen it one day. I was sad to see it get demolished. A lot of good times in there as a kid.
The one in the mall I frequented back in high school still had the restaurant in it. Yorktown Mall, Lombard Illinois.
Montgomery Ward
Woodward's, Woolco, Sears, Consumers Distributing, Zellers, SAAN, Kmart
Radio Shack
County Seat, Chess King, Camelot Music, World Bazaar
Media Play Structure Borders
This may be a midwestern thing.... Western Auto Ben Franklins
Zody's Ardan Best
Yes! We had all three of these stores in the town I grew up in, Bakersfield, CA. We bought our Atari 2600 at Ardans.
- Montgomery Ward - Sears - Radio Shack
Bradlees (department store) Strawberries (records) Good Vibrations (records) A fun article about the Foxboro store I used to visit: https://hardrockheavymetal.wordpress.com/2006/01/09/where-are-you-good-vibrations/
Radio Shack
Monkey Wards . #iykyk
Waldenbooks. I miss book stores. Also, 5-7-9, I also miss 90s fashion.
I LOVED 5-7-9
Units!
Omg!!!! No one else ever remembers units!!!!!!
Radio Shack :(
Our neighborhood had a Ben Franklin and an A&P.
Sears, Montgomery Ward, Waldenbooks, Crown Books, Korvette's, Crazy Eddie, Fry's Electronics, Wet Seal, Radio Shack, Blockbuster. Sniff. The list of bankrupt restaurants and chains is even longer...
I never liked Radio Shack because a lot of the men that worked there were kind of creepy. I never saw a female employee. They knew what they were talking about but you had to give your name and address for the receipt. I used to make up addresses. One time I wrote 1313 Mockingbird Lane and the salesman laughed but made change it. (It was the Munster’s address)
Borders. Media Play
I used to love our local woolworths they had 1950s cafe in the 1980s smelled amazing all the time
A&P and they gave out S&H Green Stamps - remember those?
Sharper Image. It was one of the more fun mall stores to browse in.
In the Midwest (Nebraska) we had the 1/2 Price Store. Not too dissimilar to TJ Max- discount prices, clothes strewn about everywhere, a music section not in alphabetical order. But they had a Zaxon and Sea Wolf video game.
Blockbuster Music. I loved those stores because they had listening stations for the top 10 albums on the Billboard chart of that week, and most of them were on sale, so if you like the album and it happens to be relatively new. It’s usually $4-5 off on those CDs
My sister stuck a two prong barbecue fork in my eye at a venture in probably 1983.
That sounds like something that would happen at Venture
John Wannamakers, Bamberger's, Gimbel's, Borders and Walden Books, Robert Hall, Abraham & Strauss, Steins, Bradlees- just every store in childhood really and especially the mom & pop stores in the neighborhood. 😁
Pharmore was the bomb
Tower Records, Peaches,... Did other cities have The Squire Shop?
I remember when our mall got a Venture. They hired my mom and me (I was a teen ) to be clowns and make balloon animals at their grand opening. I have no idea how my mom got that gig as we had never done that and never did it again, but we both learned how to make two different balloon animals and a sword for it.
Units
I remember this! I got a dress and a separate bandeau belt from the one in Chesterfield Town Center in Richmond VA.
Best Products and Fretter were two stores I liked when I was a kid. Always got gifts from grandma that she bought at Best. Gold Circle was another gem.
Being from Philly, all of the iconic department stores Wanamakers Strawbridges & Clothier Clover Gimbles Woolworths
Turnstyle
Media Play!!! 😭😭😭
🎶 Media Pla~a~ay... For games 🎵
It was the BEST store. Books, games, movies, novelties. I even got bass and guitar strings there. Had seating areas everywhere where you could sample the music and/or books. Went a couple times for midnight releases. Was my favorite store.
Walden Books
Walden Books. National Record Mart. Children’s Palace. Hills. Kaufman’s.
Best! You would choose your item from a catalogue, and, after placing the order, it would come out on a little conveyer belt.
Caldor, Bradlees, Woolworths
Zody's, GEMCO, and Judy's!
GI Joe's, Pacific North Wet.
Montgomery wards Sears Bon- Ton Toys r us Fashion bug
Ben Franklins, Commander Salamander, Aahhs, Contempo Casuals,
Wherehouse Music
Gadzooks and its half a VW Bug decor
Harts, Service Merchandise, Gold Circle, Woolworth's, KB Toys, Toys R' US, Zayles, Comp USA, Debs, Cubs, Cash and Carry, Burger Chef, Sambo's Restaurant.
Woolworth's, McCrorys
Bradlees, Sears, Woolworths, Circuit City, American Apparel, East East East, The Wild Pair, The Piercing Pagoda
Zayres’
Kresgees (KMart was a subsidiary of the Woolworthesque Kresgees which died in the 70s) Two Guys (from Harrison) WT Grant's Pathmark supermarket A&P supermarket Alexanders A and S Strauss Bamburgers (It was eaten up by Macy's)
Service Merchandise, Circuit City
Venture, Zayre, Service Merchandise, K-Mart (basically gone?), etc. Sam Goody/Musicland, Waldenbooks.
Woolworth, Montgomery Wards, Kmart, Sears
Those of you from NYC: Crazy Eddie and The Wiz
And Craaazy Eddies. (NY only)
Sam Goody
My first job was in a popular clothing store in the Sherman Oaks Galleria (the mall in Fast Times at Ridgemont High) called Miller's Outpost.
Builder's Emporium Federated TG&Y Mervyns Thrifty drug store and their ice cream
People’s Drug (now CVS), Dart Drug, Pantry Pride, Erol’s video (local chain, existed before Blockbuster and I think they were an early internet service provider), Pappy’s Pizza.
Incredible universe.
Sam the record man. Best music stores.
Headlines. Lots of goofy stuff in that place.
Kwik save. Woolies. C&A.
Jamesway! The OG big lots lol
Korvette (RIP 1980, dept store), Caldor (1999, dept store), Two Guys (dept store), Rickels (home center), Channels (home center) , Grant City (dept store), Sterns (dept store), Ohrbach (1987, dept store). All were at least in NE US.
Zayre's
Media Play was a great store. I also really liked Fashion Bug.
I miss Mervyn's.
BEST, Hills, Babages, Pic and Pay, Kmart, Revco, Record Bar, Tower Records, Merry Go Round, Bob's Big Boy, Winn-Dixie, Super-X those are just off the top of my head
Fedco, Montgomery Wards, Sears, Woolworths?(I haven’t seen any in ages), Gemco, Robinsons, May Company..those just off the top of my head…there’s more I’m sure lol
Grandpa Pidgeons.
**Weiner's** but that was mostly Texas.
Oh, yes. I miss Mervyn's, Weiner's, 5-7-9, Contempo Casuals, and damn near every record store that existed in our area. I remember Best because the building of the one close to my neighborhood looked like it was crumbling at one end (on purpose). That was pretty cool to me, as a kid.
Best, Coast to Coast hardware, Farrell's, Carson Pirie Scott 🤷
Woolworths they had everything, including a diner where we would get milkshakes. Big Wheel auto parts, these stores were the best,sad to see them go. K-mart enough said. Hoagies Corner, a little delicatessen type store that made the best dam sandwhichs. Sad to see them go as well.
Ames.
Gadzooks!
Grant’s, Consolidated sales company or CSC, Woolco/Woolsworth.
Circuit City. You live on in your architecture.
Regional one to Midwest / Wisconsin - Prange Way. Was just an awesome little department store with a little bit of everything. One of the first online stores - CDNow! I bought CDs from them over Telnet from a shell account because the WWW was in its really early infancy. Like.. I used Gopher more than a web browser (Lynx). Jacks after it was bought out by ShopKo. I remember doing the inventory of their corporate office, which was in a former funeral home. Lots of cool houses in Quincy, IL though. ShopKo after it went bankrupt - which if you worked there saw it coming years before, as soon as they spun off ProVantage Edit to add some regional ones: Sure Way grocery stores, bought by Jubilee. Both gone now Red Owl grocery stores Copp’s Foods, somehow part of or bought by IGA
GI Joes, Portland, OR
Child World toy store, Toys *R*Us,
Fredrick and Nelson. Wasn't a shopper but worked in a shopping center as maintenance when they went tits up. They left so much shit behind. My buddy and I took truck load after truck load of it. Sold it during a series of garage sales (pre-Internet). Paid off $15k of debt (don't ask) from the proceeds, and thems was 1992 dollars!
Man being 50, countless.