Grocery Archaeology

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 766-776 Adams Ave, Lawncrest, Philadelphia, PA Opened:  1950s Closed:  by 1980 Later Tenants:  car dealership > Strauss Auto > STS Tire > Advance Auto Parts Photographed:  July 2021 We're starting out in Lawncrest with a few drive-by photos of this former Food Fair store on Adams Avenue at Roosevelt Boulevard. I got lucky with a very beautiful sunset sky as I was going by on a summer evening. Unfortunately, I don't have much more information on this store's history, beyond the fact that it appears to have opened in the 1950s and closed by 1980. Not sure if it ever was a Pantry Pride, but it doesn't seem to have been. Once it closed, it was a car dealership building before becoming an auto parts store. The store looks to have been originally around 15,000 square feet and later expanded by roughly 4600 square feet. If I had to guess, I would bet that that was done after Food Fair closed and not by Food Fair. In the first ...

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 2420 E Little Creek Rd, Norfolk, VA Opened:  1950s Closed:  unknown Later Tenants:  unknown > Dollar Tree Photographed:  January 2020 Gotta love the tower! This 1950s-era Food Fair has since become a Dollar Tree, but I'm not sure what else was in between. The building looks like it originally would've been around 17,000 square feet but later expanded by about 3,000 to its present size. Tomorrow we move about half a mile east for our next store on The Market Report !

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 101 W Crescent Blvd, Collingswood, NJ Opened:  1949 Closed:  early 1960s, by 1968 Later Tenants:  Teamsters offices Photographed:  January 2021 We arrive at the Collingswood Food Fair, built in 1949 with a beautiful arched roof and tower. The store is 18,000 square feet but was apparently closed by the early 1960s . It later became a toy store and the current Teamsters offices by 1968. I love that the tower is still there, and that the arched roof is clearly visible from all directions! I assume this wall that we see would've been the front wall of the store, although I suppose it's also possible the front wall faced route 130, to the right in the above photo. I'm not too familiar with arched-roof stores of this design that had the aisles from side to side of the arch, instead it was more common for the front and back of the arch to be at the front and back of the aisles. Tomorrow, we'll be jumping a few towns to the south t...

Original Tenant:  Food Fair Address: 680 Memorial Pkwy, Phillipsburg, NJ Opened:  1950s Closed:  1979 Later Tenants:  Food Lane (1979-2001) > Ahart's Market (2001-2017) Photographed:  January 2022 Returning to the Ahart's in Phillipsburg almost five years after its closure to see what was going on with the property. To my surprise, the building remains and is still abandoned. For some background, we begin with my own pictures of the store in business in 2016, then the news of the closure , then the news of the intended replacement . The site is no longer advertised as available, but there's also no evidence of any progress going on at all. Ahart's had locations in Phillipsburg, Bethlehem, Allentown , Bath, and Blakeslee. Phillipsburg closed in 2017, Bethlehem closed in early 2021 with renovations to convert the store to a new Ideal Food Basket well underway, and Allentown closed in November 2021 with plans to replace it with a Grocery Outlet. Bath and Blake...

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 120 Bassett Hwy, Dover, NJ Opened:  ca. 1955 Closed:  1970s Later Tenants:  NJ Department of Labor Photographed:  July 2020 How about that for one gorgeous example of a midcentury modern supermarket? Shoppers at the Dover Shopping Center would've had their choice of two different supermarkets, one at each end of the mall -- this Food Fair, which opened at the beginning of the shopping center's construction, and the ACME , which moved from across the street. At roughly 18,000 square feet, the Food Fair was slightly larger than the ACME, but ACME outlasted the Food Fair by a few years. Much like the ACME, this store's front-end probably ran along the side wall visible above to accommodate for shoppers parking in the rear of the store. I now regret not going behind the store, but it was also a very hot day and I didn't want to seem all that suspicious, but we can see the back from a Google Maps street view . We have two posts again ...

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 1157 US-46, Parsippany, NJ Opened: likely 1960s Closed: 1970s Later Tenants: Pantry Pride (1970s) > Pathmark (likely 70s-2015) > Target (2018-present) Photographed: January 2020 Our third store of the day is a very interesting one! It looks like this store was built as a Food Fair in the 1960s with the mall, which also had an A&P at the other end. It later became a Pantry Pride when Food Fair converted most of their stores to that banner, later selling to Pathmark probably around the 80s. The Food Fair also probably was paired with a JM Fields department store. It's hard to tell exactly where the supermarket originally ended, but the space currently occupied by Target is roughly 75,000 square feet and the Pathmark space was probably around that size or slightly smaller. Lots more information and a great picture of Pathmark in business here . Don't forget to check out today's final post at the Patel Brothers across the str...

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 138 South Plainfield Ave, South Plainfield, NJ Opened:  1959 Closed:  1965 Later Tenants:  Drug Fair (1977-2009) > Walgreens (2009-2016) > Dollar General (2020-present) Photographed:  July 2020 Just across the street from Green Olive is this 21,000 square foot former Food Fair, later Drug Fair and Walgreens before becoming Dollar General in early 2020. The construction for Dollar General actually revealed the wonderful midcentury modern tower sign under that boring rectangle on the far left of the building. It's unclear whether Dollar General dismantled and replaced that sign, or whether they simply built around it. Either way, this building is distinctly supermarket-like. I've mentioned the former A&P and Pathmark in South Plainfield several times now, so tomorrow we're going to get to take a look at both, one on  The Market Report  and one here on Grocery Archaeology!

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 513 W Union Ave, Bound Brook, NJ Opened:  1960s Closed:  1970s Later Tenants:  Saker ShopRite (late 70s-1998) > subdivided Photographed:  July 2020 This former ShopRite in Bound Brook is about 21,000 square feet and was replaced in 1998 by the newer store , which we're also touring today. It opened in the 1970s as a replacement for an older store at 260 W Union Ave (and presumably a consolidation of the small store at 84 Main St in South Bound Brook ). ShopRite moved in here after the Food Fair that previously occupied the space closed. Tomorrow, we're moving to the west to see our first store in Bridgewater on The Market Report !

Original Tenant:  Food Fair Address:  190 Elmora Ave, Elmora, Elizabeth, NJ Opened:  1960s Closed:  1970s Later Tenants:  Pantry Pride > Mayfair Foodtown > Cost Cutters > Elmora Farmers Market/Dollar General Photographed:  ca. 2005, 2008 Repeating that first picture from our 2017 store tour of the Elmora Farmers Market , which takes up a little more than half of this former supermarket. This time, we have a little more material. Namely, a glimpse of the Food Fair arch still intact as late as 2005... Okay, yes, this is a picture of the Dunkin' Donuts outparcel. But you can see the yellow arch in the background of the image! (The Dunkin' Donuts was for a very long time a favorite hangout of my family's older members, along with the White Castle on the other side of the train tracks.) But for a better picture... Here's a look at the store under construction back in 2008. This is very interesting to me... apparently the fac...

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 2933 Vauxhall Rd, Vauxhall, Union, NJ Opened:  1962 Closed:  unknown Later Tenants:  Drug Fair > Walgreens Photographed:  November 2020 The Walgreens, formerly a Drug Fair, at the back of this strip mall in Vauxhall just a quarter of a mile from yesterday's Whole Foods  was built in 1962 as a Food Fair. For more information and a daytime picture, see here . The store is 21,000 square feet. Despite the fact that the plaza is called the Millburn Mall, this property is definitely part of Union Township. Fun fact: that was the first Five Guys I ever went to (back when I lived in Union Township). Our next store will be in downtown Maplewood, so head over to The Market Report to check it out!

Original Tenant: Food Fair Address: 12 Arlington Ave, Bloomfield, NJ Opened: 1950s Closed: 1970s Later Tenants: Mayfair Foodtown > Edwards > 99 Cent & Discount Depot Photographed: June 2020 We're returning to this store just around the corner from yesterday's ALDI . We first saw this store back in April 2019 (holy cow, that was two years ago already) and I linked to Styertowne, who has fantastic coverage of this location here . I wanted to get back to visit this store myself, if only for my own collection! Another shot of the storefront. I love this facade but unfortunately the owners have let it fall into disrepair. Not only is the paint peeling off the arches, the arches themselves (which are actually wood, not steel, in this location; perhaps it was an early variation) are beginning to disintegrate. As Styertowne mentions, the interior has been recently remodeled and functions as a supercenter for the area, with everything from furniture to groceries and home...