Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Although I originally designated Tuesday as my "pizza night" to conform with the practice of the local Pizza Hut when I was living in Fayetteville, I generally don't go to buffets anymore. I would rather wait and pay to have something exactly like I want rather than take what's out. That being the case, I've never been to this Stevie B's Pizza located in an outparcel strip at the Wal-Mart complex on Forest Drive.

Judging from their signage, their main marketing pitch (for supper, at least) was for after-game free-for-alls by kids' sports teams. That certainly seems like a viable market niche to me, especially with no Chuck E. Cheese on this side of town. In the event though, perhaps not. I may be wrong. This place may come back on October 29 as the closed for remodeling sign suggests, but closed for remodeling is a standard, hopeful, dodge of places that have actually gone under. Add to that the fact that this is a new building with Stevie B's being the first tenant, and that looking inside shows no actual remodeling being done, and I have my doubts, especially since their phone number has been disconnected.

UPDATE 3 Nov 2008:

I was wrong -- they're back. Good for them!

UPDATE 17 June 2009:

Gone again!

UPDATE 26 Aug 2009: Took the 'temporary' out of the post title -- they are gone for good this time.

UPDATE 25 March 2010: Added full street address to post title.

UPDATE 21 March 2011 -- It's now a Navy Federal Credit Union:

I changed my mind about getting on I-77 today, and turned onto Old Forest Drive at the Wal Mart meaning to hop over to Percival. As I did so, I noticed that Liquids Gentlemen's Club was closed.

I don't know what this building was originally (you can see where some windows have been bricked over), but when I was first aware of it, it was The Carriage House. I may be wrong, but I think this was the first (and for a good while only) strip club in Forest Acres, though the town boundries are kind of odd, so I'm not absolutely sure it is now, or was then in the city limits. The building abuts what was once a viable strip mall at the corner of Forest Drive & Percival Road and which had some sort of convience store, a barber shop and a few other stores which I have long forgotten. It also had a Putt-Putt course about which I posted earlier.

After The Carriage House folded, Liquids moved in (though there may have been a gap). Although the location isn't great, I suspect that it already being zoned for a strip club was a big factor. Either The State or The Free Times did a profile on the owner. I can't recall his name, but he was somehow connected with the Columbia Rap scene, either as a performer or a promoter. I don't know if that business took off and he dropped the club, if they were closed down for some violation or other, or if it just wasn't profitable. Whatever the case, Liquids has dried up.

UPDATE 2 June 2010: Added the full street address to the post title. Also did some googling and found out that the Liquids was granted a liquor license on 22 Feb 2006, but that it was revoked on 14 Feb 2007 for violations of the conditions under which is was issued -- I suspect that had a good deal to do with the club closing. Also, oddly, the first link states that the building was planned to be demolished in 2007 for a hospital, something I never heard of (and which obviously didn't happen).

UPDATE 13 Oct 2010 -- Apparently The Carriage House was a legit restaurant before it went topless. Here's an ad from the 1975-1976 Southern Bell directory:

UPDATE 11 Feb 2011 -- the place continues to deteriorate to the point that there is now a warning letter from the sherrif on the door:

UPDATE 4 April 2012 -- The building continues to degrade, but on some days it's prettier than on others:

UPDATE 1 March 2018 -- This building was razed long ago to build the back parking lot for the new Panera/Petco plaza, but here are some pictures from 16 July 2011:

I don't get into the outparcels around the Forest Drive Wal-Mart very often, but I was over there at Radio Shack the other day (needed an audio cable and wasn't willing to forage into Wal-Mart and get it cheaper). While I was there, I noticed that the Shoe Carnival store was gone. It's a fairly big place -- that was a lot of shoes! When I was a kid, I thought shopping for shoes was a step up from shopping for "clothes". Partly this was, I think, because of the neat foot measuring devices which always struck me as kind of futuristic (and that was just the manual ones. The one at Sears on Harden which was fully automatic was a special treat!). It was also partly due to the premiums given out with kids shoes. I remember compasses, decoder whistles and comics coming with Keds, PF Flyers and Buster Browns. I don't think any of that happens any more. It's like cartoons before a movie -- nice but it doesn't help the theater's bottom line. Though apparently nothing helped this place's bottom line.

UPDATE 25 March 2010: Added full street address to post title.

As I wrote in my post on Robo's Video Ardade, nothing says "80s" like an arcade. But perhaps an even better example than Robos is the arcade which was at Two Notch & I-77 (although actually I-77 wasn't completed to that point at the time).

This arcade was a spec-built freestanding building located a good ways from any customer base, or foot-traffic. Robos was across the street from the University, other arcades were in malls, this one was meant to be a destination in itself, and it worked for a while...

I remember that in the summers while I was in grad school, I would drive out to Bell Camp (to be the subject of its own post someday) for an afternoon swim and drive home via Two Notch with my hair still drying in the breeze from the car window to make a stop at the arcade. I recall that the set of games skewed a bit from my favorites, but I still found enough I could play that I could drop a few dollars and spend an hour or so.

Soon after that, the arcade phenomenon crashed and arcades all over town closed down. My memory is that the next occupant of this building was some sort of carpet store, and that there may have been another before its current tenant, a golf center. I do know people who like golf, but I'd still rather visit an arcade.

UPDATE 16 July 2010: Finally updated the post title from "Video Arcade" to "Galaxy World", and added the full street address.

UPDATE 7 January 2014: Fix street address from 7813 to 7184.