Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Family Dollar has left their original home at 1901 Rosewood Drive and has moved across the street to 1825 Rosewood Drive, which is the former KFC lot. You can see the new, custom built, building in the background of some of these shots.

I really should have crossed the street to get a better picture of this building. It has kind of a grocery store look to me, though that would put it awfully close to the old Piggly Wiggly

Well, I noticed driving down Colonial Life Boulevard the other day that Nutrition Warehouse has moved again.

I had mentioned some time ago that they had moved from one side of Boozer Shopping Center to the other, but now they have moved out of that strip entirely and across Bush River Road to the old Sounds Familiar location at 422 Bush River Road #4 (this lot actually fronts onto Colonial Life Boulevard, but that is not the official address):

I admit I'm not a big supplement customer, but I have shipped a number of items at the Forest Drive location, and their contract Post Office is quite efficient.

We were having one of our many gray December rainy days while I was trying to get pictures of Rosewood Florist so I couldn't really frame anything except out the passenger side window without getting my lens wet.

Commenter Frank reported this store closed in early December, and it does seem to be up in the air at the moment. Their Facebook page reports, in a comment, that they are moving, but there are no details as yet.

(Hat tip to commenter Frank)

This Two Notch mattress store was once one of Columbia's many Blockbuster Video locations. After that closed in 2010, A Goodnight Sleepstore moved in for what turned out to be about a five year run. I noticed recently (on one of our long runs of sunless days) that they are now running a closing sale, and the lot has a real estate sign up.

UPDATE 7 June 2016 -- Well, we are now into the 6th month of this closing..

UPDATE 27 September 2017 -- As commenter Andrew notes, this store has now finished closing, about a year and a half after it started:

UPDATE 8 May 2019 -- The north side of this building is now occupied by Domino's Pizza which moved here from the adjoining Polo Plaza.

As best I can tell from their Facebook page, Fabuless Boutique probably closed sometime early in 2015, or at least the last post there is from December 2014.

I noticed the space for lease as I was driving by in late December 2015, so that makes this vacancy about a year in length, though the Murraywood Centre in general seems to be doing fairly well.

I was out driving on yesterday and noticed a For Lease sign in the window of Corma's, which shared a building with Ed Robinson (just re-opened) near Gills Creek on Forest Drive.

A look at their website confirms that unfortunately they will not be coming back after being caught in the Great Flood. They had moved to this building in 2008 after leaving nearby Trenholm Plaza. Interestingly, their old location, though actually nearer to the creek is somewhat higher and did not flood.

If you look at the right of the first picture above, you can (barely) see Palmetto Beauty & Wigs in operation back in June 2013. Looking at their Facebook page it seems that they carried on for about another year, closing on 27 June 2014, which would mean this slot in Irmo's Quail Valley Plaza has been vacant for about a year and a half.

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This is the only store I have ever been lost in.

It was probably about 1965 when my mother took me here to do some clothes shopping. Now of course the clothes displays are shorter than almost all adults, but taller than almost all four years olds, and at some point I lost track of her among the racks and panicked, racing around the floor trying to find her. Since I didn't spend the rest of my life in the clothes department, I must have located her at some point, but *that* part of the debacle I can't remember..

This store was a regular stop for us throughout the 60s and 70s. We preferred the store brand jarred roasted peanuts to Planters and in those days when Sears was still in Five Points and Dutch Square was the only mall this store was always the closest place to pick up whatever odds and ends we needed. I brought my first record album here, which I still have, the Beach Boys two record compilation set Endless Summer for which I paid $5.25. Here I also bought the Focal brand camera tripod which I still carry in my trunk today.

After I left town in 1985, I rarely visited this Kmart and I remember noting when I came back to town in the early 2000s how threadbare it looked. Since it was still close, I did visit it every now and then, but invariably noted that whatever I had gone in for, they didn't have it, and gradually stopped trying.

(Hat tip to commenter joelc)

UPDATE 30 January 2016 -- As noted by a number of people, the store is now closed:

UPDATE 7 October 2019: Add map icon.

Fish & More opened in the old Blue Ocean Seafood Market location sometime in mid 2014. I thought I had some pictures of it in full operation, but so far have only found the "coming soon" pictures at the Blue Ocean closing.

At any rate, I noticed as I was driving down Forest Drive last weekend that the place is now Forest Island Bar & Grill.