Sunday, April 12, 2020

Vintage Pharmacy (Walgreens, former Rite Aid), Columbus, MS

Today's post highlights Lowndes County, MS, retail.

It's April, so you know what that means -- time for another Rite Aid post here on the Mid-South Retail Blog! But wait, you might be saying, I thought the Rite Aid series concluded last December, with your Union Avenue Rite Aid post and the spreadsheet on all the Memphis-area Rite Aid locations as of 2018. First, very astute of you to remember that; and second, you're partially correct. Those posts were indeed meant to conclude my series on Memphis-area Rite Aids, but I've still got two more Rite Aid posts from beyond Memphis to share with y'all this year. Both of them are from eastern Mississippi, two counties right alongside the Alabama border. First up is a store in Lowndes County.

Lowndes County is where I was born, so I do have a connection to the area. However, I've lived in DeSoto County since I was a toddler, so I don't really remember much of anything about Columbus. Still, my dad worked there for a good many years, and we visit on occasion. Most recently our visits to Columbus were driven by my desire to see the town's Kmart -- then one of only two remaining in the state -- first in January 2018, and again that November when it was liquidating.

While on the visit in November 2018, I checked out a handful of other noteworthy retail sights as well, which I'll be sharing sporadically both on the blog and on flickr in the coming years. The first of those is the Rite Aid we'll be seeing today. Well, the ex-Rite Aid, that is.

Columbus, it turns out, had two Rite Aid stores. One was much newer, a standard 1990s diamond-window build, located on the main drag, Highway 45. Located directly across the street from a Walgreens, this Rite Aid was shut down in May 2018, its prescription files consolidated into the Walgreens next door. Some photos of these stores are shown below.

Courtesy The Columbus Dispatch





The other Rite Aid in Columbus was much older, located in a more established shopping center on the east side of town. Walgreens did not have a store in this area, and so, unlike most other Rite Aids in the state of Mississippi, the East Columbus Rite Aid was actually converted into a Walgreens. A full list of stores that made the conversion can be viewed here. In all, only nine Mississippi stores made the cut. All others closed.

Courtesy The Columbus Dispatch

On that November day we traveled down to Columbus, I was aware of the fact that this particular Rite Aid had made the conversion to Walgreens, and that it was an older store, but there were absolutely zero photos online to show me what it might look like inside. Usually, I like to have a bit of an idea what I'm going to be in for at a possible destination, lest I waste my time, so initially I decided to pass on this Rite Aid. It was only when we happened to be passing by it anyway, and my mom said we might as well go in, that I did. And let me tell you -- I was absolutely stunned by what I found.


Here's our first look at the outside of the Rite Aid-turned-Walgreens. The address of this store is 201-B Alabama Street, Columbus, MS. It's located in the Gateway Shopping Center.



You can see in the above photos that Walgreens replaced the main "Rite Aid" sign on the facade as well as two other instances beneath the sidewalk overhang, but left Rite Aid's old "PHARMACY" signage intact. Rite Aid originally had an identical "PHOTO FINISHING" sign to the left of their logo, but Walgreens did remove that one.

Ready to head inside? Brace yourselves...


I hope you're in as much shock upon seeing these photos as I was upon walking inside this place. This pharmacy is an absolute vintage décor goldmine. I've never seen anything else like it, and it's amazing to me that it was still intact as late as 2018. (It's probably still unremodeled even today, but I can't say that for certain.)


Here's the view along the entire left-hand wall. Ignoring Walgreens's apparent stock issues, this store looks fantastic. The décor adopts a distinct two-toned, geometric look, with multiple rectangles forming alternating U- and upside-down U-shapes, as well as box-outs jumping out from the wall in certain areas.

It doesn't look to me like there were ever any signs affixed to the walls in most of the store; the patterns have enough going on for themselves. That said...


...there was one major department sign in the building, and that was for the cosmetics department, which occupies the right-side wall of the interior. Just look at that awesome signage! Shiny metallic letters each individually boxed in by wood paneling, joined by two pairs of delightfully faded, outdated images of models. The two-tone colors continue over here as well, plus a mirrored element not seen anywhere else inside. I love it.




Clearly, you can tell I'm happy we stopped in this store after all! The remainder of these images will focus mainly on the vintage décor; even though there's no signage, there's still a lot to see.

I have no way of knowing how things were set up in the Rite Aid days, but it appears Walgreens is using the left side of the salesfloor for its food department. Not much in the way of refrigerated or frozen goods like at larger Walgreens, but plenty of dry and snack goods. (Yes, this store is on the smaller side, if that wasn't already obvious.)




Moving down the middle actionway closer towards the cosmetics department in these three views. You can see from the aisle markers affixed to each endcap -- one of the very few changes Walgreens did make upon moving in -- how they've stocked each aisle. Really not a whole lot in the way of pharmaceuticals, surprisingly, although I guess there's not a whole lot in "normal" Walgreens stores, either. Just seems like there should be more.

I was especially happy with the bottom pic above. You likely also recognize this store from my "100 posts" teaser set.



Some more looks at the cosmetics signage, which dominates the interior. At least the shelving below is more modern!

I don't have an exact date for how old this décor is, but the photos of the models may well be our best clue in trying to pinpoint one. It is entirely possible, of course, that the store has looked like this from day one, which I'm thinking was way back in 1965 (but more on that later in this post).





Making a 360-degree turn around the store from approximately the center of the salesfloor, here's what we see:

  1. a view towards the front wall, which looks exceptionally bland compared to the rest of the interior;
  2. a view back towards the left-side wall;
  3. another view towards the left-side wall, this one oriented more towards the back left corner; and
  4. jumping over to said left-side wall, a view looking across to the back wall, which is home to the store's pharmacy counter.



Some more scenes along the left-side wall as we move closer to the rear. I'm curious what departments these colors designated back in this store's early days. The shades of teal seem easily suited to your usual over-the-counter pharmacy products, but the shades of brown could pretty well go for anything.


Here's our first peek at the back wall. Immediately two things ought to be noticeable: one, the height of the bulkhead is a little bit shorter back here; and two, very unfortunately for us, Walgreens painted the whole back wall a single shade of light blue when they moved in, as part of delineating their pharmacy department. We should be very grateful, of course, that they refrained from painting the rest of the store; but that doesn't stop me from wishing they had left this part alone, too!


Glancing across to the back right corner, we find a tiny portion of wall space between the pharmacy counter and the beginning of the cosmetics department that adopts the same geometric pattern seen on the entire left-side wall, done up in one of the two shades of red used for the cosmetics signage. However, no cosmetics are located in that particular area.



These two pics are the best I was able to get of the pharmacy. While this store was pretty much deserted on my visit, what activity was present was concentrated -- understandably -- at the pharmacy, so I didn't want to get too close and risk drawing attention to myself. However, these drawn-back views are pretty valuable, in my opinion, as they give us wide looks at the entirety of the rear wall.

The second pic in the above set does a particularly good job of showing how the pharmacy, intriguingly, had a wood-paneling border that met in the middle to form a peak, not unlike a triangle. I can only imagine what this area looked like with its original signage and paint colors...



Of note, too, is the fact that the pharmacy counter itself is old-school as well... and in any other situation, that would be a great find worth focusing on. But here, it's easy just to ignore it and move right on back to that cosmetics signage, haha!



One more look across to the left-side wall, before we slide on down to the edge of the cosmetics department on our way to the front end. I'm going to assume the flooring and ceiling, just like the décor, are very dated, if not original... in which case they've both held up pretty well, too.




As I said earlier, the front end here is pretty bland compared to the rest of the interior; whether or not that was Walgreens's doing, Rite Aid's doing, or it was simply like that all along, I don't know. The fact that Rite Aid's signature 90s pink and blue countertops (as seen in close-up in the middle pic) are present here suggests to me one of two things: either Rite Aid updated the front end during that era, or took over this store from some other pharmacy chain back then. Really, I have no clue what chain this place opened as, but I'm pretty confident it's always been a pharmacy.


It took quite a while for a cashier to come up front and ring us out; I guess this store must not get too many non-pharmacy customers (or, alternatively, the employee simply didn't care). Either way, it does seem that this pharmacy is a welcome asset to its community, so that -- coupled with the fact that Walgreens didn't already have a store in East Columbus -- likely is what spurred Walgreens to convert this former Rite Aid, rather than close it like they did so many others.




Headed back outside, here are some more close-ups of the unique logo-holder sign built into the facade and Rite Aid's leftover "PHARMACY" sign, followed by a nice straight-on shot of the newly-minted Walgreens. There aren't really any images online from the Rite Aid days, or else I'd link to some for you.


Located next door to the Walgreens and serving as anchor to this plaza is a locally-owned Food Giant grocery store. I didn't go inside, nor did I really think anything of this place until I accidentally stumbled upon this while trying to find those aforementioned Rite Aid photos:

Courtesy The Columbus Dispatch

This post keeps getting better and better, haha! The above ad is for the grand opening of this plaza, known as Gateway Shopping Center, and anchored by Woolco. The celebration took place Wednesday, September 15th, 1965. Unfortunately, the photo is too dark to make out any signage for the next-door pharmacy, but at least it's a very good indication that the pharmacy dates back to 1965 at the earliest -- and the décor could be just as old, too.

Separately, I found this post stating that the Columbus, MS, Woolco was among the first small-format stores for the chain, which makes it pretty special in its own right!

EDIT: Looking at the present-day aerial view, I'm now thinking the pharmacy is actually carved out of the right half of the old Woolco space. So I guess it doesn't date back to 1965 after all, and if it is indeed in part of the old Woolco space, then it couldn't be any earlier than 1983, which is when this Woolco closed (alongside the whole chain). It's still vintage, then, but perhaps not as old as it looks...


While a Woolco-turned-grocery store is a pretty interesting conversion itself, I didn't know that at the time of my visit, and thus only got the one photo. Besides, I'd say this Rite Aid to Walgreens conversion was interesting enough, and I hope you'd agree! Above is one last photo of the property, from out in the parking lot. But before we go, there's one last twist...


While on vacation in Savannah, GA, the following summer, and eating at a pizza place, I noticed the CVS in that shopping center looked awfully familiar. Do you see the resemblance? Yep -- this CVS has the very same logo-holder sign and lighted overhead sidewalk sign as the Columbus Rite Aid-turned-Walgreens! This indicates both stores opened as part of a pharmacy chain, which evidently had locations widespread enough to be in both Columbus, MS, and Savannah, GA. Unfortunately, I still have no idea which chain that might be, but the address to this CVS Pharmacy is 7360 Skidaway Road, Savannah, GA, if that helps. If any of you know anything about the origins of these stores -- or how old the décor is/who would've originally installed it -- please share that information with us in the comments!

EDIT 2: It would seem these both were former Revco pharmacies! Check out the comments for more information...

That'll do it for this April's Rite Aid post. It's from outside the Memphis area, but I'm sure you'll agree it was a lot more fun than just another liquidation! Again, I have one final Rite Aid post up my sleeve, which I hope to share with y'all this August. More immediately, I've got some cool stuff coming your way this summer, although I haven't decided quite yet which stores collecting virtual dust in my archives I should feature :P  I'll make that decision soon enough though, and hope you all will join me back here next time as I hit publish on those posts! Until then and as always, thanks for reading, and -- once it reopens -- have fun exploring the retail world wherever you are...

Retail Retell

12 comments:

  1. Wow that's an incredible find! That decor looks pretty 60's to me. I think it's safe to say this started out as something other than a Rite Aid. They hadn't made it that far south by 1965, and if this was carved out of Woolco after they closed, Rite Aid would have used their rainbow decor. I'd love to figure out who had this store originally, maybe there's more out there!

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    1. Thank you! I agree with you, this décor looks very 60s or 70s to me. Of course, I wasn't around then, so I can't say for sure, and the evidence seems to be pointing to it being from the 80s. So maybe my era meter is off :P But if so, glad I'm not the only one, haha!

      Per AFB's comment below, seems pretty certain this was a Revco - it's nice to have an answer!

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  2. Awesome store! That decor is an amazing relic, and has to be original to when this store first opened as a pharmacy. I like the shiny letters on the cosmetics sign too, which is a neat feature. It's neat this place has held onto that old decor for so long, and through different ownership too!

    Speaking of the lineage of this store, I want to say with 95% certainty this pharmacy began its life as a Revco. Pictured here is a former Revco in PA, which has that same rectangular walkway sign seen here and in Savannah: https://www.flickr.com/photos/62355920@N00/5899978286
    The Savannah store also has those same skinny front windows as the old Revco I linked to in PA. I'd also say with a good certainty that decor is Revco's too (which is an even better bonus, as Revco went out of business in 1997). I know Rite Aid was hit or miss with remodeling when taking over competitor's stores too, so it wouldn't surprise me they let Revco's decor stay in tact for so long.

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    1. Thank you! I agree, on all points.

      Ah, thanks for digging that up for us! Yep, definitely looks like the same facade elements, and a Google search turns up additional stores with the same look. Mystery solved!

      That also explains why the Savannah store went to CVS, since CVS bought Revco (I wonder why this Columbus store didn't). I saw on Google Maps the Savannah store has a vintage interior itself, but I'm not sure if it's from CVS or a later package from Revco. It's the same package that can be seen in these images: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ryanrules/sets/72157631877179080/

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    2. You're welcome! Glad to be of assistance.

      From what I understand, Revco was originally going to sell out to Rite Aid in 1996, but that deal was squashed by the FTC due to monopoly concerns. Even though that deal fell apart, I wonder if Revco still managed to sell Rite Aid a handful of locations (like this one in Columbus) as a way to raise money before the company sold out to CVS the next year. That's my guess as to what happened here, unless Rite Aid buying this store was truly a one-off instance.

      And the decor package in the CVS you linked to is CVS's 90's decor (that I can confirm, as I do remember when that package was common!) Unlike Rite Aid, CVS is much more thorough when taking over their competitor's stores, typically wiping away most major traces of old decor with their own.

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    3. That's interesting about the 1996 deal - I bet you're right. And thanks for the confirmation on that CVS package as well! Besides Rite Aid, most pharmacies seem to be kept pretty well up to date, so it's cool to see an older CVS décor out there too.

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  3. Let me start by saying that this is my first post here at the Mid-South Retail Blog, but I've been checking out the photos from Retail Retell and the other Memphis/Northern Mississippi retail bloggers on Flickr for many years. I learned about the blog when I saw Retail Retell on the Louisiana & Texas Retail blog a few weeks ago and it's excellent. Keep up the good work!

    As for this Walgreens, wow. I've seen photos of vintage Rite-Aids before on Flickr, but this one might be the most vintage of all the ones I've seen. On top of that, Walgreens is pretty quick to give their stores some kind of modern look, at least here in Houston, so I'm shocked that they kept this store as retro looking as it is. Perhaps the budget for remodels just isn't there right now for Walgreens? Maybe Walgreens plans on replacing this store in the near future? Maybe they walked into this store and were as charmed by it as we are? Who knows, but I'm glad you were able to catch it.

    I'm not so familiar with Rite-Aid because we don't have them in Houston, but we've had Walgreens for decades and CVS for about the last 20 years. CVS came in shortly before Eckerd checked out and, like elsewhere, many Eckerd locations became CVSes. CVS is okay, but I think almost everyone preferred Eckerd. They were a real favorite around here.

    Anyway, I'm at the point now that I'm pretty curious whenever I see a Walgreens in a shopping center here in Houston because they aren't very common. These locations are usually from the 1980s or earlier. Of the handful of locations that I know of, most of which are in high income areas, they all have pretty modern interiors so one has to try pretty hard to find vintage aspects.

    While this Walgreens may not have any vintage Walgreens aspects, it's a real shcoker to see it look as retro as it is regardless of whose interior design it is. So, yeah, I'm glad you were able to capture this. This store is so much of a throwback that it reminds of the days when Walgreens and other pharmacy stores had lunch counters.

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    1. Hey there! Welcome to the blog, and thanks again for all the kind words!

      "Wow" is a good reaction to this place for sure, haha! I'm with you, this is the most vintage pharmacy I've ever seen. However, in this area we're pretty much Walgreens-only, and like you said they're good about keeping their stores modern. So I haven't had much of a chance to see outdated pharmacies or even other chains such as Eckerd either.

      Rite Aid did have a larger presence around Memphis in the past, but dwindled down over the years, and finally the last ten all shut down in 2018 following the sale to Walgreens. CVS entered the area in the mid-2000s if I remember correctly.

      Anyway, yeah, I don't know why Walgreens didn't remodel this place when they moved in, but I'm not going to complain! For all I know, they could've remodeled since I took these pictures, but I hope not. Still, it does seem odd that they didn't. I've got a video I found that's coming up in my next (final) Rite Aid post that shows other conversions from around the state. Walgreens remodeled most of the stores, but not all. This store wasn't even in the video at all.

      Shopping center pharmacies are rare for sure, and I'm glad it reminds you of pharmacies of days gone by. Like AFB said in the above comment string, it's pretty likely this one was originally Revco, but no matter what it's still cool. Thanks again for the compliments!

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  4. Very cool find! I never would have thought to hop inside a Walgreens to look for vintage décor but it looks like I will have to consider it now! I know of a Piggly Wiggly turned Rite Aid turned Walgreens that would probably have some neat stuff in it. I think my favorite paint scheme in this store is the red corner next to the pharmacy counter, and it is a shame Walgreens had to paint over the back wall next to it.

    Walgreens took over the Rite Aid closest to me but it was only a '90s store that moved from across the street. I really wish I had seen the old store before they moved. Growing up, the new store seemed run down until Rite Aid did a really good remodel a few years ago. I feel like the store is a lot nicer with Rite Aid having remodeled it than it would have been if Walgreens had done the job.

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    1. Thank you! Yeah, it wouldn't really have crossed my mind to go into a Walgreens for vintage décor either, but this really worked out in my favor, haha. It wasn't even on my list of places to stop, either, so I'm glad we did! I doubt other Walgreens have very many vintage goodies like this, but then again some of the converted former Rite Aids probably do have some interesting stuff going on more than a store that's always been a Walgreens...

      I agree, it's unfortunate Walgreens had to paint over that back wall where the pharmacy is, but I'm glad that's all they touched. I like Walgreens' current décor package, but Rite Aid's décor in that store near you probably is better looking -- they do a good job with their packages.

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    2. Also, that Food Giant store is a 1980's-build Winn-Dixie.

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