Northern Florida Retail Blog

Save-A-Lot #114 2605 NW 13th Street Gainesville Plaza Gainesville, FL Save -A-Lot to my knowledge entered Florida in the 1980's. But I'm not sure about that. Maybe some of you other retail fans could fill me in on the correct answer. From the look of it, it appears Gainesville's original Save-A-Lot (the store in this post) opened sometime back in the 90's. Again, I'm not sure of the precise date on that either. I do know one thing; Save-A-Lot felt good enough about the Gainesville Market (or perhaps local politicians insisted) that the abandoned Food Lion in east Gainesville should be occupied by another grocery store. Publix won't touch each Gainesville with a 39 1/2 foot pole.   There have been many articles in the Gainesville Sun over the last 2 decades which have spoken of the blight in east Gainesville. Save-A-Lot did in fact move into the left half of Former Food Lion #1154 which opened back in 1993. In January of 2013, just 9 months aft...

The Fresh Market #214 15500 P.C.B. Pkwy. Panama City Beach, FL After watching a beautiful sunset at the west end of Panama City Beach, you realize you are hungry. However, you'r not quite in the mood for a sit down restaurant and certainly not wanting cheap fast food like Taco Bell or McDonald's. You know that Publix makes delicious subs but the rest of their deli stuff is ho hum. But you're not quite craving a Pub Sub. What do you do? Well, if you don't mind dropping a few extra dollars, The Fresh Market is a pretty nice foody store. Some of you retail fans have probably seen photos of Fresh Market before, but this one is a fairly new build Fresh Market. This store opened back in September of 2015, so that makes this store only 4 years old upon my recent visit.  The Fresh Market is a very nice (and upscale feeling) supermarket. Honestly it's so upscale feeling a middle-classer like myself feels a bit out of place inside this store. I can ...

Target #811 2340 Hwy 77 (M.L.K.- Jr. Blvd.) Panama City, FL Long after the Panama City Mall opened in 1976, the corner of Hwy 77 and 23rd Street had been a relatively quiet corner, with the exception of the super large Albertsons #4355, which opened in 1983 at the northwest corner. Heavy commercial/ retail developments had also happened westward along 23rd Street (FL-368) during the 1980's. Shopping centers such as Stanford Station, Wilbro Plaza, and Panama City Square had opened between 1985 and 1987. Stanford Station was anchored by Bruno's- owned Food World, which opened in 1986. Also opening directly across the street in the sprawling Panama City Square was Walmart and nearby a Delchamps Super Store.  So by the late 80's people in Panama City had 3 large supermarkets along 23rd Street between Stanford Rd. and Hwy 77 (Then Cove Blvd) that were open 24 hrs a day and offered liquor sales separately (at least I'm sure about Albertsons and Delchamps hav...