Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

I was shooting against the light, and didn't really have time to get out, so these aren't great shots, but the Wild Wing Cafe in Columbiana Station on Bower Parkway is closed due (mostly) to the COVID-19 crisis.

I say "mostly", because looking at the Yelp reviews, this place was pretty clearly on its last legs, and you have to feel kind of sorry for the corporate rep who had to comment on the 1-star reviews with apologies. Curiously, the Copper River Grill in the same shopping center (and which will soon feature here) had similiar reviews, and the spot there which was most recently (I think!) HuHot Mongolian Grill has been a revolving door for years. For some reason, restaurants don't seem to do well here..

(Hat tip to commenter Heath)

UPDATE 23 August 2022: Updating tags.

Casa Linda in Forest Acres is one of my go-to places, but I don't think I've ever eaten at any of the other locations. I have eaten in this *building*, back when it was a D's Wings. Casa Linda set up shop there probably around 2013, and lasted until the end of 2019.

Actually commenter Heath mentions that this closing was more like a tidy ownership change, with El Patron quickly setting up there after year's end.

I'll note that the plaza marquee still touts the comics shop that closed in 2017.

As I have mentioned before, my mother, who had a taste for the odd & exotic, used to stop in at Pier 1 from time to time while I was growing up. Since that time, I believe I have only been in a Pier 1 once, and I have never been in this Harbison location.

This store is in an outbuilding by the Outback wing of the Harbison Court shopping center, which I used to visit fairly frequently for Barnes & Noble.

The State has the story on the closing, mentioning that the retailer is closing about half of its 900+ stores. So, say, that's more than 400 locations, which is a pretty whopping number. The retail apocalypse continues..

(Hat tip to commenter JCB)

UPDATE 30 June 2020: Update tags

UPDATE 22 November 2021 -- Now a Popshelf:

Value City Furniture has relocated from The Meeting Place (formerly Capitol Centre) behind Columbia Mall and has opened in the old Toys 'R' Us in Harbison.

I believe this whole complex is now owned by The Meeting Place church, so I don't know if they will seek another retail tenant, or use the building for church functions. I did not see any indication that it was for sale or lease.

Just as a note, there seems to be some confusion on whether the road around the mall is Columbia Mall Boulevard or Columbia Mall Road. Google maps uses "Road".

(Hat tip to commenter Andrew)

I did not know that Lifeway was the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, which obviously is not going anywhere. They are, however, unable to keep these stores open during the ongoing great-unretailing, and plan to close all 170 of them. The plan is to maintain an online presence, though how that will work out I don't know given that Amazon certainly lists religious books.

This storefront is in an odd little plaza that wants to be connected to the one behind it, but isn't, making access harder than it needs to be.

Somewhat ironically, this store moved here fairly recently, previously having been on the other side of Harbison Boulevard.

(Hat tip to commenter JamesR)

The first seven (excellent) pictures here are provided courtesy of commenter Heath.

This Circle K location first stuck in my mind some years ago when I stopped and noticed that the Subway restaurant in the back was clearly built in what was once a automated car wash slot, complete with a guide lane now leading nowhere.

I am a fan of the current round of Circle K rebuilds. The new stores are attractive inside and not at all cramped, plus they have nice bathrooms, which works in their favor on long drives. My cousin was touting Florida's Wa-Wa stores at Thanksgiving, and I think that is the kind of thing the new Circle Ks are targeted at. Of course, some of the older plots won't be large enough to do it.

(Hat tip to lots of folks, possibly commenter Arthur was first. And big thanks to commenter Heath for the pictures!)

UPDATE 17 April 2019 -- Construction is continuing apace:

UPDATE 13 February 2020 -- Open again:

UPDATE 29 March 2023: Updating tags.

American Deli replaced Burger King in this slot in the Columbiana Centre food court sometime around October of 2017. I'm guessing that it probably closed at the start of January 2019, as that would be a logical month/year boundry for a lease, and commenter Matthew Benjmain reported it closed as of 11 January 2019.

It looks like there are two remaining American Deli locations in the Midlands, one on Garners Ferry Road, and one on Decker Boulevard.

(Hat tip to commenter Matthew Benjmain)

Here is another of Harbison Boulevard's Mattress Firm stores. It looks like they already have a new tenant, Rainbow, lined up, though I have no idea what that is.

I confess I have very little reason to go to Harbison Court anymore with both Barnes & Noble and Chili's being gone though I guess I did eat at Olive Garden once last year.

(Hat tip to commenter Andrew)

This storefront is in that faux Tudor little strip of Harbision around the Bower Parkway intersection. Portrait Innovations listed in the 2018 phonebook, so I'm pegging the closing as this year. From what I can see Portrait Innovations is a national photography chain, and there is still apparently a store at Sandhill.

Apart from all the conspiracy theories, apparently the ubiquitious Mattress Firm just thought that Nothing succeeds like excess. It's not always a terrible business model. For instance, if you see two Circle K stores located across from each other, the thought is that This is a busy intersection, and *somebody* is going to put a gas station across from us to catch cars going the other way -- it might as well be *us*.

It can be more problematic for something like mattresses, which aren't a convenience purchase, or as the Houston Chronicle puts it:

Why store-on-every-corner strategy didn’t work for Mattress Firm:

Mattress Firm, as it gobbled up rivals and tripled its store count to more than 3,300 locations, seemed to have a storefront on every block — sometimes two storefronts. In its quest to become the biggest player in the $15 billion U.S. bedding industry, it pursued a strategy of clustering shops close together with the aim of crowding out competition.

It didn’t work.

The Houston retailer said as much when it filed for bankruptcy Friday, acknowledging that it operates too many stores and plans to shutter as many as 700 locations as it tries to get out from under $3.2 billion in debt through its Chapter 11 filing, which allows companies to restructure operations and finances while protecting them from creditors.

“I think they’re humbled,” said Seth Basham, an analyst with Los Angeles-based Wedbush Securities. “They grew far too fast with ambitions to be a national retailer.”

The Wall Street Journal has some more details including that the crisis is a world wide one in some sense:

The bankruptcy marks a rapid fall for the once high-flying bedding retailer and Steinhoff, the South Africa-based retail conglomerate that has been called “Africa’s IKEA.” Steinhoff, whose purchase of Mattress Firm marked its entry into the U.S. market, has been caught up in an accounting scandal that erupted in December. Its creditors, who hold billions of dollars of the company’s bonds, agreed to suspend all payments on its debt for three years. Steinhoff is expected to launch a debt restructuring for its European business in the U.K. later this month.

Commenter Andrew supplies a link that lists the South Carolina stores affected (so far). For the record, they are:

This particular store is next to Jimmy Johns, more or less near the top of the Harbison hill going towards Saint Andrews Road. As of yet, they have not posted any closing signage.

(Hat tip to commenter Andrew)

UPDATE 7 November 2018 -- Here you can see (poorly) that the store has been cleaned out: