The Market Report

Why don't you stop by your friendly neighborhood Pathmark and... oh wait a minute. This name tag dates back to the 1970s, when my aunt worked at the Elmora location . My father (her brother), on the other hand, decided to get a job with his friends at... Foodtown across the street, which is now long gone . (You can, however, still see the faint marks left from Joey's name.) Love the midcentury modern design on this name tag though!

And you ain't kiddin', brother. The above patch, which measures about 4" in diameter, most likely came from the grand opening of the Elizabeth, NJ ShopRite  in 1994. This sticker, however, which has long lost its stickiness, is more recent, although I don't have a date. Most likely not from after 2002, when the logo was changed.

For your holiday enjoyment, here's a 1992 discount card from Kings Food Markets, based in West Caldwell at the time (now one town west in Parsippany). Kings later ended the Signature Club, only to bring back a similar loyalty program sometime around 2016. Now, the sale prices advertised in the circular are only available with the card.

From here on, The Market Report, The Independent Edition , and Grocery Archaeology will be posting stores entirely geographically. I'm switching to this instead of the random kind of chronological kind of not order I had done previously based on the themed weeks I've had. I hope it'll be easier to read! To begin with, for the new year, we're going to Queens, NY! And I don't think we've ever been there. So all of the stores we're about to see are brand-new. We'll be taking a look at them a few neighborhoods at a time, starting in the northwestern corner of the borough, with Long Island City, Jackson Heights, and Corona. This group will have posts on The Market Report and The Independent Edition . Come back on January 1st for our first store tour!

Here's a little something to tide everyone over until The Market Report returns on January 1st! A few more random grocery bags from my own collection, following up on my first post on The Market Report. A pre-2002 ShopRite bag. Go fresh, go local with these Pathmark bags. Not sure on a year, but probably close to the final bankruptcy. I feel like I've posted this White Rose bag before, but you're gonna see it again anyway... And this one will be memorabilia soon enough, with LIDL's takeover of Long Island-based Best Market: Not a supermarket bag, but an old retail bag nonetheless: From the Elizabeth location. This one goes out to my friends at A&P Preservation . The 1990s Bravo logo makes an appearance on this bag. Not sure where it's from. And we're finishing up with this bag from Kings. I believe I posted this one previously but now we get to see both sides... Over and out for now. Happy holidays! Come back to The Market Re...

Hello folks! Sorry for the interruption in programming. I'm reorganizing the posting schedule and will be taking a little while off. You can expect daily posting to resume on January 1, 2020 with finishing out Queens and Staten Island. Part of the change is that I'll be combining my Queens photos from July 2018 with my Queens photos from January 2019, so that we have more logical geographic coverage even if the pictures were taken at different times. From there, we have lots more exciting stuff coming up, including multiple states that The Market Report has never before visited! See you soon and thanks as always for reading! Zachary Our next store, in Queens... any guesses as to where or what it might be?

We're wrapping up our Manhattan stores with this Associated in the Peter Cooper Village of Manhattan. Unfortunately, yet again, a redevelopment has resulted in rents rising and a coming Trader Joe's nearby, causing owner Joe Falzon to make the decision to close up shop after 26 years. You can read much more here . It's a real shame, but it's happened so much that it's not even surprising anymore. I'll be sorry to see this one go, though. At the far end of Peter Cooper Village, though, is a relatively recently-renovated  CTown that I really liked. This store is located at 409 E 14th St. Tomorrow we're going over to Queens for the first time on The Market Report, I believe! Photographed August 2017

Our third Manhattan Food Emporium (see here and here ) was one of my usual haunts for lunch when I was in the neighborhood in the summer of 2017. I knew I could get a good lunch of two empanadas, fried plantains, and vegetables with a bottle of iced tea for under $9 - quite the deal in this neighborhood - from the hot food bar. Like the other two, this was owned by A&P and was taken over by Key Food member Seven Seas Supermarkets in the bankruptcy. Like the Times Square South location, this one has two entrances, one in front and one in the back. This is by far my favorite Food Emporium location of the three I've visited, as it's the most solid supermarket and also seems to be the most heavily used. All of the service departments are fully stocked and well-used, even the bakery which is unusual for an urban supermarket! Great hot food, too. It's located at 10 Union Square East. Photographed July 2017

This D'Agostino is a perfectly acceptable supermarket, though nothing special. It's in better shape than most of the D'Agostinos I've been to, and the building is certainly more interesting. It looks like the lower brick building to the left (the store now extends into the two-story building on the right) might be a very old supermarket, maybe an early location of the D'Agostino chain. This store, located at 790 Greenwich St, Manhattan, has some amazing sales. Excuse me, amazig. D'Agostino always has high prices, but I think it's worth considering they're one of the very few supermarkets that actually operates in the neighborhoods they're in. But not in the way you might think -- they run stores in some of the most affluent (and highest-rent) neighborhoods of Manhattan, meaning that all the lower-cost stores have been driven out of business by rising rents. So I don't think it's particularly helpful to say that Food Bazaar usually has ...

Just blocks from the United Nations headquarters is this Gristedes. Owned by the Red Apple Group, Gristedes has recently become a member of Allegiance Retail Services. It's located at 748 2nd Avenue. Photographed February 2018

Like the Fairway we saw last week, these pictures come from the summer of 2016 and are not particularly the highest quality, so apologies in advance for that. ( Yesterday's post came out a little better.) Unlike yesterday's, though, this one has been very nicely renovated to the A&P Fresh 1.0 package. This one is all on one floor, though it's in the basement of an apartment building. This particular location seems to get less traffic than the other, and fewer tourists (more residents). I liked this one a lot better, although it's smaller and less deluxe! It also shares ownership with the other one. A&P leftover signage! Meat, seafood, deli, bakery, and dairy line the exterior walls. Pretty substantial service departments for a very small store, even a full in-store bakery! The seafood counter is small but present. Dairy and frozen are at the far end of the store from produce. A&P decor remains in all its glory! These are ...

Like the Fairway we saw last week, today's post and tomorrow's post come from the summer of 2016 when I had a far inferior phone camera. It's actually a two-story setup, with a food court, bakery, and deli on the first floor and produce, meat, grocery, and dairy/frozen in the basement. Because of this store's proximity to Times Square, there are huge quantities of tourists coming through this store. That's why the main floor is so upscale and features so many grab-and-go foods. Gorgeous deli counter. This store was owned by A&P, although it transferred ownership to Seven Seas Supermarkets with Key Food in the bankruptcy. Some A&P branding remains... Hartford Reserve was A&P's deli storebrand. However, there's also an attempt at distancing itself from the old owners... Beautiful bakery counter, too. Heading down to the lower floor, we see much older decor, and a much dingier setting. And full A&P decor remains. ...