The Market Report

Original Grocery Tenant: A&P Address: 5684 PA-115, Blakeslee, PA Opened:  unknown Closed:  unknown Later Tenants:  Ahart's Thriftway (open by 1976) > Ahart's Market Photographed:  October 15, 2023 Time for a little bonus post! A commenter on a Flickr photo says this 15,000 square foot was originally an A&P, but by 1976, it was Ahart's Thriftway. By 1998, it was still a Thriftway, and the following year, the newer location had been opened across the street. I'm not clear whether it opened as a Thriftway and later switched to Great Valu, or if it has been a Great Valu since it opened. Now for a look at what's next door... A 45,000 square foot former Jamesway at the other end of the strip mall is now a somewhat strange indoor flea market, but it definitely has signs of its Jamesway past, including the fact that the flea market sign is a banner over the old Jamesway sign. In the bathrooms, we have a more explicit indication... The strip mall is now mostly...

White Haven Market Owner: Christopher Kubishin Opened:  2005 Cooperative:  none Location:  501 Main St, White Haven, PA Photographed: May 25, 2019 Welcome to White Haven, a small town of 1100 in the eastern part of the Coal Region, and incidentally the hometown of protagonist Liz Lemon on the TV show 30 Rock (although it's a heavily fictionalized, and much larger, town in the show). White Haven is located along the Lehigh River, where the Delaware & Lackawanna Railroad once had a line, and today that railroad is a bike path. While the supermarket in town is today the White Haven Market, the store of just under 10,000 square feet was built around 1970 as an ACME. In fact, it is a very flat pitched-roof building , and what used to be the side of the store is now the front as a strip mall has been constructed extending out of what used to be the front. We'll see evidence of this change inside. Before we go in, a look at the railroad heritage of the area. Here we also se...

Original Grocery Tenant: A&P Address: 1213 E Broad St, Tamaqua, PA Opened:  1970s Closed:  1993 Later Tenants:  Ahart's Thriftway (1993-1999) > BRL Grocery Outlet (closed 2018) Photographed:  November 29, 2019 We're now just outside of Tamaqua, a town of around 7000 which these days has a Boyer's right downtown, where we're headed tomorrow. The town also used to have a second supermarket, built as an A&P that closed in 1993 and became an Ahart's Thriftway. Around 2000, the space became a BRL Grocery Outlet, a local chain of discount grocery stores also referred to as Buy Rite Liquidators. They also took a former ACME in Coal Township, seen here . BRL closed in 2018 and mostly cleared out the space, except for some assorted shopping carts and some refrigerator cases seen at the back of the store. It's lucky there were lights on inside! As you can see in the first picture, I was here after dark, so it was just good luck that we can actually see inside...

Main Street Market Owner: Duane and Nichole Smith Opened:  1995-2022, sold in 2019 Cooperative:  none Location:  90 N Main St, Bangor, PA Photographed:  December 22, 2018 Today's store has a bit of an interesting history. As you might be able to guess from the facade in the first picture, it was built as an A&P, probably in the 1950s. In the 1970s, it became a Thriftway , then Main Street Market in 1995. I visited in late 2018 and the following year, the store was briefly closed and then sold. After some light renovation, it was reopened only to close again in 2022. The 13,000 square foot store has a great classic supermarket feeling, or I suppose it had that feeling since it no longer exists -- and as far as I know, the space is currently vacant. You enter on the right side of the storefront, seen here facing the parking lot, and walk across in front of the registers to the left side where produce and meat line the wall. Deli is on the back wall, with frozen pa...

GIANT Food Stores Opened: 2006 Previous Tenants:  Stewart's Thriftway (closed 1991) > Clemens (1991-2006) Location:  5835 Easton Rd, Plumsteadville, PA Photographed:  January 12, 2019 Contributor:  Lucas from Grocery Voice Thanks to Lucas from Grocery Voice (and A&P Preservation ) for today's pictures! He's given us a few sets of store photos we'll be seeing, as he lives out in this area. Today he's providing us a look at the GIANT Food Stores of Plumsteadville, PA, which was originally a Thriftway and then was purchased by Clemens in the 1990s. Although Clemens sold this store to GIANT in 2006, we still can tell the store was here, such as with the facade that looks nearly identical to the McCaffrey's in Blue Bell . Other signs are less subtle... The old Clemens lettering is still very clearly visible behind the GIANT sign on the main mall sign -- or at least was when Lucas took the pictures back in early 2019. The store has since been remodeled, per p...