Happy New Year!

…and welcome as we kick off a new year of Pleasant Family Shopping, where we take a look at those places you’ll remember all your lives, though most have changed. Most forever, not for better, some are flea markets now, but some remain. I know you’ll often stop and think about them, and when you do, please stop by! (Apologies to Lennon and McCartney.)

Our subject is retail chain stores of the past – mainly old discount stores and supermarkets, but we throw in a department store chain here and there and take an occasional trip to the mall just for fun. We discuss the history of the companies behind the stores and of course, those individual store locations that were the site of fond memories for so many of us. Best of all are the photos - scenes from life back in the day, whenever that day may have been – the storefronts, the store interiors, the people who worked and shopped there, and usually at least one guy wearing a tie.

And as you can see, our New Year’s Eve party is still goin’ on! We’ve stashed Mom and Dad’s Mantovani, Percy Faith and Andre Kostalanetz albums in the cabinet, and we’re spinning The Lovin’ Spoonful, The Cyrkle (must be what they’re dancing to right now) and The Mamas and the Papas, all on that tiny portable record player. Later on we’ll play the new Troggs 45, if we can find that darned little plastic insert ring. We're stocked up on Coke and Canada Dry Wink. And dig our new game – Milton Bradley’s Twister, the game that ties you up in knots! (The Twister TV commercial was pretty danceable itself. It ran for years!)

This great scene is a 1966 Woolworth’s publicity shot, officially captioned as follows: “These typical teenagers are completely clothed in apparel from Woolworth’s ready-to-wear and accessory departments. The phonograph, television, records, musical instruments, games, novelties and “rumpus room” decorations also came from Woolworth’s. By catering to the youth market, our stores have become “in” places.”

“In”, and soon to be "far out!"