Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

I believe at one time this hole in the wall rib joint in an old house on Decker may have updated its slogan to Slap Yo Mama Good! but I can't verify it (and I suppose they were lucky Mick Jagger never drove by..). This was apparently a one man operation, and got pretty good reviews on Yelp, though apparently there was no indoor seating.

We'll stay with Decker Village for another closing. The store at the far right end of the plaza started as an Eckerd, transitioned into a Rite Aid and is now a Walgreen's.

This is the least Walgreen's looking Walgreen's in Columbia, and is the only one I can think of off the top of my head that is not a standalone building. To be fair, it wasn't a very Rite Aid looking Rite Aid either.

The Free Times reports that Pho Viet closed on 28 March of this year, something that I had not noticed.

I have only had Pho once, and it was here. I thought it was quite good, but I didn't care for the fact that they only allowed one tea refill.

This building was originaly a Burger King, and after that, it was a Zesto. In fact, you can still see the Zesto influence on the drive-through and Thank You signs.

The Free Times also reports that this is not the end for Pho Viet but that they are moving to 9308 Two Notch Road. This is the former site of Farm Bureau Insurance, and in fact that building was setting up to be a restaurant called First Class Bar & Grill which never came to fruition, but which probably cut down on the prep work for Pho Viet.

On a semi-related matter, there is apparently some type of major construction going on in this plaza, judging from the storage containers all about. I have seen a number of Food Lion stores being upfitted recently, so perhaps that is is, though I did not see any evidence of construction at Food Lion itself.

UPDATE 18 December 2019 -- Now Submarine Crab, one of the inexplicable wave of new crab restaurants in town:

UPDATE 14 May 2020 -- The new Pho Viet location at 9308 Two Notch is open (or at least was open before COVID-19):

I noticed in my visit to Columbia Mall back in March that there was an empty storefront on the upper level for Frontline Hair Designs.

As it turns out, they have moved, and have been open again since April in their new location at 9557 Two Notch Road Suite H. This is in the Sesqui Center shopping center just east of Spring Valley. You can check out their Facebook page here.

Here's another empty counter in Columbia Mall's food court. I don't know anything about it, but google does suggest that there was a Mano's Express in the Dutch Square food court. It seems an uncommon enough name that I suspect they were related, though the other one seems to have focused on soul food, while this one went the burgers & dogs route.

I noticed when I was in the Columbia Mall food court recently that China Max was closed. It's been quite a while since I was at the mall last, so I'm just tagging the date as 2018 for lack of anything more precise. I presume this China Max was connected with the China Max at Richland Mall, but I don't know for sure.

What I find especially interesting is the sign proclaiming that the place will soon be a King's Pizza. This pizza chain seems to be making a big splash all of a sudden, with a store on Forest Drive in the former Charlie's Wings, one opening here, and one opening in the old Chickadee's Diner on Marshall Street.

I don't know much about autoPROS Columbia other than that it was a used car dealership, and had an idiosyncratic sense of capitalization and word spacing. This space was previously Stivers Subaru, which closed in 2011. After that, I think the spot was vacant a few years before autoPROS moved in, and probably will be again now.

(Hat tip to commenter Matt)

UPDATE 11 July 2019 -- Now American Car Center:

According to Wikipedia, which has what seems to be a reasonable summary, Charlotte Russe filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on 4 February 2019, in the event, no rescue was forthcoming, and the chain announced on 7 March 2019 that it would be closing all its stores.

There are two Charlotte Russe stores in the Midlands. This one at Columbia Mall and another at Columbiana Centre. The Columbia Mall store is centrally located on the upper level, in between the old Dillards and Macy's above the mall's center court.

I'm not sure what's going on with the lights dangling down in center court. I guess they could be leftover Christmas lights. At any rate, I'm sure they would be more attractive if they were lit rather than hanging there dark like that.

Well, this happened sooner than I figured, and this store was completely gone by the time I got around to visiting Columbia Mall.

Of course, it appears to have been a failry small store, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. As you can tell if you click through on the mall directory, Payless was on the lower level just two storefronts down from the former Sears. The storefront to the left of it is also vacant, though I'm not sure what it was.

As a reminder, Payless declared bankruptcy on 14 February 2019 and all the chain's stores have closed or will be closing soon.

Kaboto Express was the follow-on in this storefront to Schlotzsky's Deli, and opened around September of 2011.

I notice that their initial signage did not include the phrase Hibachi Grill, and I wonder if they just weren't finished putting up the sign, or if that was a later direction shift.

(Hat tip to commenter brian)

UPDATE 13 March 2019 -- Work is on to open as Slice Of Columbia pizza:

UPDATE 7 February 2020 -- Slice of Columbia is open (and has been for a while):