Save Mart thoroughly blandified the Grocery Palace pet section, but at least it's still in its original location, unlike any other (ex-)Grocery Palace I've visited! While the original wall decor is all gone, they did at least leave the paw prints on the floor, including an obvious gap where Albertsons would have had an additional aisle. The decor makes me think that Save Mart did keep Albertsons' expanded pet selection at first, but by this point, it's been cut back to the typical cat/dog stuff you would expect to find at a grocery store.
If I visit a pet aisle, it is usually by accident or because I'm looking for something else on those aisles since I don't have any pets. That said, it looks like this Save Mart has more pet accessories than I remember our Kroger and Randall's stores having so I guess at least they are somewhat putting this space to good use.
ReplyDeleteI can't remember what Albertsons would have had in their pet departments during the Grocery Palace era (pet departments wouldn't have been relevant to me at the time either), but was it more than what other supermarkets had at the time?
I don't end up shopping for pet stuff in grocery stores all that much either, but what Save Mart has is pretty similar to what I've seen in larger Safeways. I have no idea what the original Grocery Palace selection would have been like, but I've always assumed it was fairly extensive considering how large and prominent the department was! From what I've seen, it seems that this was one of the first departments to get cut down at the end of the Grocery Palace era.
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