Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Buck Cooper Motors is a right at the intersection where Two Notch and Shakespeare flat-iron into each other and is actually a tiny little lot for a used car place. I've noticed for a while now that there were no cars on the premises. I stopped by a couple of weeks ago, and there was a sign on the door to the effect that all cars had been moved to another Buck Cooper location. That sign seemed to be gone when I went back by today.

UPDATE 17 Feb 2011: Added Phillips 66 to the post title based on the comments.

UPDATE 9 April 2011 -- It's now Classic Auto, tinting and carwash:

I've held off doing a post on Uncle Sam's because I don't remember much about the place. In fact, I can't say for certain that I ever set foot inside, though it certainly was a longtime fixture on Two Notch while I was growing up. I have the feeling that it was either a shoe store, or a sort of discount department store like Rose's. Despite the name, I'm not recalling any top-hatted mascot, or red white and blue bunting about the place, but I could well be wrong at this remove.

The current bingo and thrift store operations have been there for at least ten years at this point

UPDATE 5 March 2011: Added the "Showplace of Values" to the title. Be sure to see commenter Ronna's thoughts below.

Gabby's Pizza replaced D'Avino's Pizzaeria (which closed in September 2009) in the little doorless corner spot across from the former Chick-Fil-A. On the face of it, this seems like one of the better spots in Dutch Square, as it sits just down from the movie theaters so that you could grab a slice before your show, but in practice apparently no so much.

While I don't know this for a fact, the name "Gabby's" is unusual enough when associated with pizza that I'm sure this outfit was connected with Gabby's Pizza & Buffet which recently closed at Fashion Place on Decker Boulevard.

(Hat tip to commenter Kc)

This Quiznos is in the Barns & Noble plaza on Harbison, right in-between where Sesame Inn used to be and Barnes & Noble itself.

Normally I'm a little sceptical when a place claims to be closed on a temporary basis as these periods without money coming in have a way of becoming permanent. On the other hand, in this case, the pickles are still in the pickle jars, so there's some evidence that, at the least, the store hasn't been unstocked.

(Hat tip to commenter Tom)

UPDATE 10 March 2011 -- As mentioned in the comments, the closure looks pretty permanent now:

b>UPDATE 15 March 2013 -- It's now a Yoghut:

"100 great wines for $25 or less" -- it sounds like a reasonable enough idea, but the as Corked found out, the area may not be ready for wine stores. Or possibly they sold their 100th bottle and achieved their mission.

Is there another two story retail gallery in the area? I can't think of one right now.

Golf Etc. at The Village at Sandhill, just south of Panera is gone now, and is already almost another mattress store. I actually had a picture of this place as Golf Etc., but appear to have deleted it in a fit of absence of mind.

I have to admit that I personally find golf (at least the kind without windmills and dinosaurs) much more soporific than mattresses anyway.

This coffee shop, at the corner of Sparkleberry Lane and Clemson Road, and in the same building as the former Za's pizza was one of those places that seemed to have adopted the business strategy of never being open. You know the kind of place -- you're sure they're not out of business, yet every time you drive by the lights are off. Now maybe my view is skewed by Starbucks and expecting a coffee shop to at least be open while it's still light outside during the summer, but my experience is that every time I found myself driving home from Sandhill via I-20 and really wanted a cup of coffee, they were shut. The one exception was when I was in the area around lunch time and found they did, in fact, make a decent latte.

At any rate, they are now definitely closed 24/7

I'm not much of a clothes shopper, so I've never made it to Weathers of Columbia on Devine Street at Woodrow Street, but it looks as if you want to do so, you should do so soon.

Of course, I thought that in 2008 too, and in fact almost did a closing on them then..

This year's sign is a bit more definitively worded, though their web site doesn't have any mention of it.

Rish Florist (aka Rish Flower Shop) is on that little strip of State Street in West Columbia that also houses Terra and The New Bookland Tavern. They appear to have expanded out of their original space over the years to take what looks like three different storefronts. I really like the Depression-era glass blocks in parts of the building.

The closing sign says that they had been there for 57 years -- that is certainly a record that anyone could be proud of.

(Hat tip to commenter JB)

UPDATE 20 September 2012 -- Well, somebody apparently has a plan for this building. The interior has been gutted, and there is some sort of zoning hearing scheduled:

American Apparel was a clothes store on Harden Street, next to the old Hiller Hardware. I gather that it served the young, hip, crowd, which is, um, not me.

In fact, for years, I didn't even know where the store was, just that it had a series of mildly risque ads on the back page of the local alternative weekly, The Free Times. These were constant fodder for the paper's Rant & Rave feature, as here, for instance.

When I went by on Saturday 5 Feb, there was still music playing from the store's door speakers, and two guys hanging around like they were supposed to be loading stuff out of there but couldn't get inside.

Doing a little googling turns of the surprising (to me) fact that American Apparel (AMEX: APP) is the largest clothing manufacturer in the United States.. They also seem to have had a good bit of financial trouble in their retail arm lately, as detailed in this WSJ piece and this "Open Market" piece (which also has an image of an ad they could never have run in Columbia..)

The company's web site goes even farther with ads -- DEFINITELY NSFW!

(Hat tip to commenter Jennifer)

UPDATE 12 September 2011 -- The follow-on operation, Urban Thread & More is open, and apparently has been at least since 16 April 2011: