The produce department saw the most change in the remodel, with all of the Albertsons-style displays replaced with new (and much fancier) Safeway-style ones. I wish the Safeway remodels would have gotten these same displays, which look much nicer with the new decor than the Safeway Lifestyle ones (which are entirely the wrong color of faux-wood).
The Albertsons floor might have been very plain and boring, but that's still an upgrade over this patchy Safeway mess. At least that's my take on the situation, lol, but maybe we agree on matters this time.
ReplyDeleteFlooring issues aside, and those are hard to overlook, I must say that I quite like the Safeway decor better in this space than the Albertsons decor. The Albertsons decor just looked a bit too austere. There was just too much white going on. Even with the good organization of apples, the Albertsons looked a bit too much like a discount grocer with all those plain walls. The woodgrain Safeway decor does liven and class things up a bit.
Although we had Albertsons here in the past, it's been about 20 years since they left. Thus, I saw something very odd in an Albertsons photo and I'd like to borrow your expertise on Albertsons (AFB, if you're reading this, feel free to jump in, lol). Je of the Louisiana & Texas Retail Blog posted a new post today about a recent Kmart closing sale in Lake Charles, Louisiana. That Kmart shared a shopping center with an Albertsons. I took a look at that Albertsons and I must admit that I'm bamboozled by a sign they have hanging from the ceiling there. Here is a photo of it: https://goo.gl/maps/iejYPMsZYvKHz1Pz6
Look at that Albertsons hanging sign in the upper right corner. Is it just me or is that Albertsons logo all wrong? Isn't the leaf supposed to be the darker blue or something? Something just looks off about that, but I can't quite tell what, lol.
Here is the link to that store itself. As you can see, it did get a recent remodel and it was probably necessitated by damage from one of several hurricanes to hit that part of Louisiana in recent times. Anyway, I think the decor at that Albertsons is much nicer than the decor at this Albertsons before it was turned into Safeway (I actually prefer the remodeled Albertsons decor to the Safeway Modern decor). Link: https://goo.gl/maps/VoJVEGAeU9vghiub7
Here is Je's Kmart post if you want to see that: https://southernretail.blogspot.com/2020/06/kmart-lake-charles-louisiana-finale.html
The floor this store used to have was actually fairly nice for an Albertsons. It was pretty plain, but not the generic cheap vinyl that I can't stand. As I've said before, a nice vinyl floor is always my preference; I just really don't like plain white vinyl. I do agree that the new decor looks nicer, but I actually quite liked the old PF&Hv1 decor this store used to have -- but I always like uplighting and 3D wall accents.
DeleteHa, yep, the leaf is totally the wrong color in that logo! I think the Albertsons text is the wrong color too -- it's supposed to be the light blue. I really don't get how someone manages to mess that up -- can't you just google "Albertsons logo" and get something at least somewhat correct??
That new decor looks nice -- I haven't seen that one before! When I was researching stores for my Portland trip in 2019, I saw one that had those aisle markers, but not the wall decor (I have no idea what decor it had, but that one's all new to me!). In Western Washington, the newest Albertsons decor we got was the Albertsons LLC decor (which I don't particularly like), which was installed in stores that converted from Haggen back to Albertsons -- since then, the only Albertsons remodels I know of were conversions to Safeways (though there might have been one recent one where an Albertsons was remodeled to Modern Decor without rebranding -- I can't be sure of that yet, though). That decor looks quite nice, but I think I prefer this one myself.
It would be interesting to know how many different decor packages Safeway/Albertsons is currently using! Over on Discord where there's been a bunch of Kroger discussion lately, the consensus is that Kroger is currently using between 6 and 8 different decor packages all at the same time. I doubt Safeway/Albertsons has quite that many going, but it's possible since I keep hearing of new ones I didn't know about!
Wow, I didn't realize that you had not seen that Albertsons decor before. I'm quite a fan of it. I like the colors. It's got a cheerful, but classy look to it. Albertsons seems to have put some nice flooring in that store as well which always helps. I like that they used real wood (or so it seems at least) for the meat & seafood department signage. Link: https://goo.gl/maps/bTFsnDbaPiLxjsxy7
DeleteI really don't know how many decor packages Safeway and Albertsons might have. Safeway is a minor player here and most of the Randall's stores around here have Lifestyle v2. Although Albertsons stores aren't too far away in places like Lake Charles and Dallas, the Grocery Palace decor was Albertsons' latest and greatest decor package when they were still here in Houston. That's been a while to say the least!
Yeah, you're right, there is no excuse for bungling that Albertsons logo like that. I wonder who was responsible for that! Oh well, at least the store looks nice!
Re: the new Albertsons décor... check out this link (courtesy of YonWoo's most recent blog post): https://cdscandoit.com/work/
ReplyDeleteWow, I didn't realize that YonWoo covered Louisiana & Texas Albertsons stores on his blog earlier this week. I suppose I'll have to check out his blog more closely, lol. Thanks for the link, Retail Retell. I certainly shared this information with Je and his blog readers as this discussion will probably be of interest to them.
DeleteSo it seems that the Lake Charles Albertsons has the 'Heritage Decor'. I really like it! I did find another Albertsons in Louisiana with that decor in Lafayette: https://goo.gl/maps/2fqjS4cC5rx4dgie6
From some research I did on Dallas area and Louisiana Albertsons, it seems that most have been remodeled in the last 2-3 years and most have received the 'Legacy Decor'. The Lake Charles and that one Lafayette Albertsons seem to be the exceptions that got the 'Heritage Decor'. They both look pretty nice, and they are fairly similar, but I like the 'Heritage Decor'. It's interesting that they call the dairy case the "Dairy Box," lol. The 'Heritage Decor' seems to be more cheerful than the Safeway 'Modern' decor. However, since these Albertsons decor packages make so much use of the Albertsons logo, I suppose we shouldn't expect to see them at places like Randall's. I suppose Randall's and such will stick to using Safeway decor that is more generic.
It should be noted that in North Texas, Albertsons seems to be pretty committed to keeping both Albertsons and Tom Thumb (Safeway) stores going. They're not converting the Albertsons stores into Tom Thumbs or vice versa. I'm guessing NW Retail wishes the same was the case in his area, but oh well.
Yeah, the more of that decor I see, the more I like it! Too bad it's probably not going to show up around here. Nice to finally see a real name for the LLC Decor! It's also a bit odd to see that they have Neighborhood listed under QFC -- I'm almost certain that decor didn't originate with QFC.
DeleteOh, and speaking of Safeway/Albertsons decor packages I didn't know about, check out pages 24-31 of this PDF. I posted this on Discord, and no one knew much about it. It's from a Safeway redevelopment in Seattle that's in such a wealthy, NIMBY neighborhood that the neighbors feel entitled to micromanage the store's design down to the interior decor, apparently. Have you seen this one before? It looks quite nice!