Houston Historic Retail

While I was up in Humble, I also grabbed a photo of the new Joe V’s going into the old Conn’s, which was before that Kroger.

This photo is a couple of weeks old now, and may not reflect how it looks now. However, my visit did give me some good information on the store's future.

Crews are still in the midst of prepping this old building for a new grocery store, but a good amount of major exterior work is already complete. Finishing touches are still being done to the outside, but the major work has moved inside.

While we don’t have an exact ETA yet, I don’t think it would be out of the question to see this store open by late January or early February. Of course we’ll have to wait and see what HEB says. In the meantime, if you have any newer pics of the store, drop them in the comments!

Where else do y’all think HEB should add new stores?

I visited Deerbrook Mall recently to see what’s going on at their former Sears. In 2025, we learned that a Family Entertainment Center was planning to rehab the property, with a planned opening in the summer of 2026. The original date has come and gone, but work does seem to be occurring at the mall.

Score already has some built-in competition with Japanese arcade chain Round One, which opened in Palais Royal’s old spot early last year. Score will have an advantage with this larger location. In addition to video games, the venue plans to offer multiple sports “simulators” and a Rudy’s BBQ location inside.

It’s unclear exactly how much longer construction will take, but during my visit I noted most of the work is limited to the first floor, with the second floor sitting gutted and mostly empty, at least for now.

What do y’all think about Deerbrook Mall leaning into entertainment? Where else do you think arcades should open in Houston?

Who remembers shopping at Gerland’s?

When we talk about supermarket history in Houston, Gerland’s is sometimes forgotten, but they were an important game changer in our area.

Gerland’s history begins in the 1940s. Originally a single location, the two Gerland
brothers would multiply their concept into hundreds of locations, including a franchise program by the 1970s. Stores would even make their way to DFW, albeit for only a few years.

Gerland’s key success was adapting the independent grocer model. They were quite the chain to be compared to, with Randalls taking at least a few cues directly from Gerland’s operations.

While Gerland’s did great as an independent, they always played second fiddle to the big chains. They would pick up stores the others dropped and whip them into high gear. However, by the early 90s the company found themselves needing to change once again.

After years of price-intense grocery wars, Gerland’s seemed to be one of the only local chains that predicted what was coming with HEB. Gerland’s spent the next few years developing a low-cost format and helped get Food Town up and running. They would eventually license the Food Town name and logo, flipping some of their stores.

Gerland’s was always interesting; even their Food Town locations were open 24/7 well into the 2010s. In 2015, the company was sold to Food Town, with the remaining Gerland’s locations flipping their formats.

Gerland’s name hasn’t been used in the Houston market for over 10 years now, but many of the stores they once operated are still going strong. Which locations did you visit?

I stopped by the Freebird’s on Westheimer near Shepherd yesterday to see what’s been going on. This location is supposed to replace the one that closed last year, also on Shepherd,
Closer to 59. I’ve always been a big fan of Freebirds, but it seems that the smaller burrito chains have been struggling these past few years.

This last time I checked this out, not much work had been done, and now it’s starting to look like a restaurant. There’s no ETA for this store to open. Hopefully, when it does open, it does a better job than the old Shepherd location, which was getting pretty nasty before it closed.

When was the last time y’all went to Freebirds? What did you think?

We’re back in Tennessee for some more photos. Today we’re visiting an Ingle’s. Before I go any further, a couple of folks ask why I’m posting photos of stores we don’t have in Texas. My take on it is that there are some aspects we’re missing out on. The grocery game in Houston is cutthroat, and all the major players put looks, layout, and service on a lower tier than pricing. That being said, only about 20 years ago we still did have entire chains that prided themselves on not being the cheapest, but the best overall. I feel like it’s worth showing the stores I visited on my trip to see what we were missing out on, and maybe what we could one day have again.

Okay, so on to Ingle’s. This is in Elizabethton, the place where we also looked at a Grocery Outlet. Ingle’s is right across the street, and let me tell you, it’s a very nice store. Ingle’s is still family-owned, and you can feel the family pride from the owners' photos hanging on the service desk to the sparkling-clean interior.

The store was well appointed; you can find just about anything you’d want at an Ingle’s, including a good lunch on the run. The store, like others in the area, seems to offer grocery carryout as th default option, and all the staff was very polite. It really reminds me of the Randalls of my childhood, not just in operations, but also the look and layout. While I doubt we’ll get any Ingle’s in Texas soon, it was very cool to visit.

Check out the newest addition to the HHR Retail Museum! This name tag is, of course, from a Gibson’s Discount Center.

While Gibson’s kept its Houston operations mostly in the outer suburbs, it did have a presence here for many years, and as a Texas chain, I feel it’s worth representing.

Do you have a piece of retail memorabilia you want to share with me? Send me a message!

🚨 Breaking Retail News 🚨

As reported by Chron. com, the former Kroger of the Villages may soon become a Sprouts. This location is somewhat significant in local grocery history.

Originally a Safeway, it was the only location ever significantly expanded by Safeway’s successor in Houston, AppleTree. It was built to resemble the most recent Safeway design used in Texas at the time; its sister store at Hammerly and Gessner, which Kroger also closed, was the prototype.

As seen in photos on Chron. com, the demolition of the facade is currently underway.

Fiesta employees have been spotted working at the soon-to-reopen Bear Creek location this week. During my last visit in July, contractors were still setting up refrigeration and other critical systems. According to the Chronicle, the store is expected to open in September, so we’re getting close!

Thanks to Pet de Tails Grooming LLC for providing the photo and information!

Now and again, you find a retail remnant you weren’t expecting to see. These are photos from the Katy HEB Plus, on 99 at Fry. I haven’t been to this store in years, despite it technically being the closest HEB Plus to me.

Now, to start, it’s worth mentioning that HEB Plus as a concept is just about dead. This store really didn’t carry anything that you can’t find at other stores; it just carries more merchandise in general. Long gone are the days of HEB trying to stock full electronics or clothing departments.

That being said, it’s still a cool store because it’s got some very old decor. I’m not sure if these signs are what the store opened with, but I do know I was surprised they were still up when I visited last week. Maybe one of y’all is an expert on HEB decor and can provide some insight.

I like seeing the “nostalgic” decor still in use. How about y'all?

Salad and Go has filed for bankruptcy and will close its remaining locations in Arizona and Nevada by the end of the day today.

This is something I predicted just under a year ago, when rumors about Salad and Go first started to pop up. The restaurants had already been on my radar, having built out multiple locations but never opening them (like the Tomball location featured in the photo)

While rumors were flying, the scope changed from closing all stores to just those in Texas, and finally just some areas of the Lone Star State. On September 19, 2025, Salad and Go closed all locations in Houston, Austin, and San Antonio. By January 2026, the remaining locations in DFW and Oklahoma were also closed, along with a production facility in Dallas.

Every time new closures were announced, Salad & Go doubled down on the idea that they were not going under. While I do believe these cuts were meant to be helpful, I think Salad & Go had its fate sealed last year. To me, this seems like a classic case of overexpansion.

I personally liked the concept and was a big fan of grabbing a salad from the drive-thru. However, as my commenters mentioned, over time the quality decreased, and the prices went up. In turn, customers stopped going, and Salad & Go couldn’t afford to keep up with the expansion they had already started on. It also unfortunately hit employees quite suddenly, leaving many without jobs, sometimes with only a couple of days' notice.

I’m sad to see the end of Salad & Go. It was a cool concept born out of a steakhouse, and while I think it was scalable, I think Salad & Go moved faster than it could keep up.