Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

This Dollar General at the corner of Taylor & Barnwell streets had actually closed once before, on a temporary basis. In September of 2023, they apparently experienced severe staffing issues, and the store was closed for a number of days. After working through that, they are now caught up in the chain's downsizing as it sheds a number of, largely urban, stores. The Post & Courier has the story.

According to that article, the store will be open until 25 April, but it was already looking pretty picked over when I stopped by on the night of 20 March, more than a month out.

(Hat tip to commenter Larry)

I was going down to the Greek Festival last weekend, and noticed this Dollar General (in a former Eckerd) on the corner of Taylor & Barnwell streets. was closed.

The sign doesn't give any reason, but assures us that it is temporary. If I had to guess, I would say staffing issues, but of course I don't know.

From what I understand, Eckerd was long an arm of J. C. Penny, which was looking to dump the thing for years before it was able to. That notwithstanding, Eckerd went on a building spree in Columbia a few years before the chain was finally taken over by Rite-Aid.

This included building a number of new stores which went under even before the take-over was in the works, and this building, at 1720 Taylor Street (between the train tracks and the old Big-T) was one of them. My memory is that it closed down almost as soon as it opened, though that may be something of an exaggeration. I'm not sure if it was caught in the chain's problems, or just not a viable location. Dollar General proves retail can work in that spot, but Eckerd's was a bit pricier.

UPDATE 15 May 2011: Changed closing date in post title to April 2000 based on commenter Andrew's research.

UPDATE 10 August 2020: Add map icon, update tags