Anonymous in Houston, this one's for you! Here's the cafe seating area, obviously still closed off due to COVID in early 2021. That diagonal wood paneling with green stripes is... not good, and I'm pretty sure that green paint is the same stuff from Remix that I just called hideous over on Retail Retell's post. But at least the ceiling things make some amount of sense in this location, even if the ceiling is a bit low.
I'm having a seat, but I still don't believe it! I still don't think I've ever seen these 'Have a Seat" departments at any Krogers here. I even went on Google and looked at some Krogers I rarely look at online and still didn't see anything! I will say that this all-caps Have a Seat sign looks less goofy than the all-lowercase one in the 2012 font at the Hot Springs, AR Kroger.
ReplyDeleteWhile looking through some of those Houston area Krogers I don't see very often, I did find this implementation of Marketplace decor in a Kroger with a drop ceiling and Millennium era (I guess) flooring. It looks pretty good, but it looks a bit different to me. Maybe that's because of the drop ceiling, I don't know. It does look like they've opened some parts of the ceiling up around some of the edges of the store.
https://goo.gl/maps/9Ztwxi2Mhp72HyXu5
Are these bistro signs common? Or do they just stand out more here?
https://goo.gl/maps/tcPDb4BPbgGPqXPaA
This looks a bit odd to me, but maybe the low ceilings are throwing me off.
https://goo.gl/maps/syf71Pz4SwWvMyzj8
Let me also post three other Southwest Houston Krogers for your decor evaluation (or anyone else's, I think I've shared the top one with Retail Retell already some months back). These are some of the odder Krogers in town:
Deletehttps://goo.gl/maps/mKLBXWhRNjqU92oq6
https://goo.gl/maps/ZCWxeM2LZohACywp9
https://goo.gl/maps/YZJKYBfoj5gWML9J7
The last one has Marketplace decor, but with some rather odd flourishes that seem a bit unusual to me, but maybe you know how common they are.
Yeah, I've seen some low-ceiling Banner stores before -- they're definitely a bit weird! I think that one you linked to was a fairly early Banner remodel -- I'm pretty sure that style of bistro signage is an early Banner trait. The dairy signage is weird too -- don't think I've seen that elsewhere.
DeleteThat last store you linked looks fairly normal to me, but it's hard to pin down what's "normal" or not for Banner because it changed quite a bit over time and had different versions in different places. The first two from your second post both appear to have the original Marketplace decor, which was Banner's predecessor (but not at Fred Meyer, which I don't believe ever used that package).
Ha, now you're gonna make me look bad -- clearly you write your descriptions fresh, whereas I had all of mine written for this week as of Sunday :P In any case, yeah, not a fan of this shade of green either!
ReplyDeleteAs for the "Have a Seat" terminology, I never really saw that in any of the Memphis area stores, but I have seen it in other images, so I'm familiar with it being used as cafe signage. They actually had this exact signage up in Oxford early in the remodel/expansion, but wound up replacing it later with some different (much better!) stuff.
Ha, I've long wanted to start pre-writing my descriptions (since I often have something I want to say in mind when I take pictures, only to have long forgotten it by the time I actually post them), but I've never had the time or energy to really do that.
DeleteI'm not sure how common "Have a Seat" signs are, but Fred Meyer used them from time to time in Banner remodels too. Interesting to hear that Oxford would actually change the signage in the middle of a remodel, but I've seen plenty of strange things happen in Fred Meyer remodels, so I suppose it's not too surprising!