Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

As far as I can tell, the official way to refer to this parents' chain is buybuy Baby with the two lowercase buys mushed together followed by an uppercase Baby.

Doing a bit of google work turns up surprisingly little about the specific troubles of this sub-brand. The parent company Bed Bath & Beyond, has been hit hard by retail changes in general, and COVID-19 in particular, and has published plans to shut down around 200 underperforming locations. This would leave about 1200 storefronts, so it is by no means an abandonment of the market. CNBC has stories on this here and here. Neither article specifically addresses buybuy Baby though the second one seems to include those locations in with the Bed Bath & Beyond locations.

The company itself is announcing buybuy Baby initiatives with words like renewed and expanding in the text to, at least, give the impression they still have faith in the brand:

'welcome to parenthood' is buybuy BABY's renewed promise to help make the transition to parenthood as seamless as possible and invites all customers into this new community—which is designed to support parents with the guidance and advice that's best for both them and baby.

buybuy BABY's renewed purpose is part of its parent, Bed Bath & Beyond Inc., to transform the business around the customer as a digital-first, omni-always retailer. The Company last year introduced digital services such as Buy Online Pickup in Store and Curbside Pickup, along with Same Day Delivery, and continues to innovate to put digital purchases into the hands of buybuy BABY customers even sooner.

Be that as it may, *this* store in the old Circuit City location in Harbison *is* closing, and has started the final sale.

(Hat tip to commenter Andrew)

UPDATE 15 June 2023 -- Apparently setting up to be a Planet Fitness:

Moms On Main was the follow-up in this storefront to the relocated Al-Amir, though the building is probably still best remembered for The Elite Epicurean.

An article in ColaDaily pegged Moms to open around New Years of 2020, and I suppose it did, though unfortunately I never got around to going there.

The article quotes some reactions to the forthcoming opening,and I have to show one as it turned out to be so sadly, and badly, wrong for all of us:

“Calling it now, 2020 is going to be a great year for Columbia! I can’t wait to try this spot!!” –@theoverflowfoodblog

(Hat tip to commenter Justin)

I don't know much about Graph-Itti except that they a screen-printing and embroidery shop, and had been in this Rosewood location for a good while.

According to their Facebook page, they moved from here to 3620 North Main in August of this year.

(Hat tip to commenter Sidney)

I don't normally grab a lot of pictures that aren't mine and put them up, but in this case they seem to have mainly come from a ".ru" site, so the cork is probably already out of that bottle, and I think it makes an interesting contrast:

I ran across this former Ramada Inn off I-95 exit 157 in Florence a few weeks ago, took a few drive through pictures, drove off, thought about it, and came back for a walk-through.

What I find interesting, apart from the general decrepitness is that the property seems to have operated well into 2020, judging by the COVID signs on the office (where the lights are still on). In fact, many of the rooms still look ready to go, though others, of course, do not. If it did run that late, I would put the closing date as well *after* the swimming pool fill-in date, as that looks to have been done a good time ago given the plants in the hot tub area, and the patchy grass on the pool itself.

Apparently at the end, the manager lived in-house, as there is a second story room with an irritated sign saying no knocking after 8PM as it is not an office.

To me the architecture with its fence around the top of the building and the corner towers looks a bit like a stalag, and I can't imagine what purpose the enclosed huts on top of those served. I would say AC, but the rooms appear to have had standard outside-wall AC units:

I'm not sure what Young's Plantation is, or why it merits a shout-out on the sign.

LoopNet says the property is six acres and at one time was on the market for $495,000, although it is apparently no longer for sale.

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I was in Parkland Plaza last weekend and noticed that the insurance agency by the nail spa was gone. Google is not helping me on dates here, but I'm going to say 2020 since I don't think it could have been vacant longer than that without my noticing it. (Though, admittedly, I have proved to be startlingly unobservant at times). It looks like though I have done a number of closings for suites on the State Street side of the plaza, I have never done this one in particular.

It's back to Lugoff for this Shoney's on US-1 past US-601 on the way to Camden. Shoney's had fallen on hard times even before COVID-19, but that seems to have been the deciding factor here. Looking at their Facebook page, it appears they temporarily closed for COVID in July of 2020. Judging from Google reviews, they reopened at some point after that and then closed for good sometime in the spring of 2021.

I really should stop by a Shoney's sometime and get the Hot Fudge Cake -- it's been years since I had one.

Interestingly (or not) there is a closed restaurant just East of here that I took to have originally been a Shoney's, but that seems unlikely with this one so close by.

If you look closely at the marquee underneath the Pepsi sign, it almost looks like it says DINER, something that would make sense with that advertiser. What the diner, next to the current TitleMax, might have been called, I can't determine, or exactly when it closed. Google Streetview goes back to 2007, at which time it was already Liberty Income Tax. Also going by Streetview, it appears that Liberty closed or moved sometime between August 2015 and March 2017.

I am not sure what is currently going on here. There appeared to be a lot of food trucks parked in the back lot, and there has been a Mexican looking emblem put on the the front of the building, but judging by the furniture piled up against the windows and lack of a sign, it does not appear to be a retail restaurant.

UPDATE 19 October 2021: Changed first part of post title from Diner to Terry's Diner based on the comments.

UPDATE 19 September 2022 -- Now open apparently as a Mexican & more restaurant:

I thought I would be able to read the "move" date from the door sign, but in the event my picture came out to be more of my hands and the camera than the actual sign. At any rate, Trident Pain Center has moved from this office park on Sunset down the hill from I-20 to 176 McSwain Drive.

Which leaves only the question: What have they got against Robert Carter?

This section of Two Notch is not actually on the main road, but is sandwiched between that and the railroad tracks, and is accessible only at or near the light for Spring Valley. I had done a closing for a bank in the area, but had never driven back towards the east where there is a tailor shop at the end of this spur.

This building is the last one before that shop, and as you can see from the pictures, is built on a bit of an incline, so the parking lot is noticably lower than the street. I like the building and the lot, and the lack of traffic -- it's a good place for a destination business. I'm not sure when the Pitts office moved, but I don't recall seeing the real estate sign before, so I'm going to just call it 2021. According to their door sign, you can now find them at 8313 Two Notch.

I'm not clear if Nutrition Warehouse and Carolina Barbell gym were co-located in this storefront, or if Carolina Barbell came afterwards, and google isn't helping me out. Either way, neither is there now.

I don't believe I had ever driven back into Sesqui Station, and none of it is visible from Two Notch, so I was rather surprised to see the size of the place, though it is hardly bustling now. As I recall there was quite a controversy about it back in the day as it was built on land carved out of Sesqui State Park -- something that really isn't supposed to happen.