Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

As I was driving up from Henry's the other week, I passed this building, which has featured here before as Mote's Store, Frink Street Tavern & Frink Street Pub, and noticed that it looked to have been set up as a distillery, and to now be vacant.

A little googling established that it was Southern Essence Distilling, established in 2018 & operating alongside an art studio, and that during the pandemic, they stepped up with a hand sanitizer production and donation operation. You can read about that here on WLTX. I'm unclear if they were able to re-open for normal business after the pandemic, and I don't see any articles on that, or on the place closing.

One notable feature of the place (now gone) was apparently a large wire sculpture of a Star Wars Imperial Walker. You can see a picture of that here and watch a story about it here.

Here is an archived copy of their web page.

Rick's was a fishing and ABC store right across Bluff Road from the Columbia Industrial Park. I never went in, but I would see it often driving to and from work a few years ago. This is right next door to the old Cricket Club/Diamonds and the old Grasshopper Club/Vet's Hall. I'm not sure when they closed, but it's been long enough to board the place up and take down the road sign, so I'm going to guess 2020.

While I was out looking at the Edenwood Bi-Lo, I noticed that in the adjacent strip mall All N Good Spirits (a name which I like) has moved to 1622 Airport Boulevard, which is somewhere need the old Cayce K-Mart.

I kind of like the folklore quality of identifying liquor stores with red dots. I think it was more a legal thing, at least at one time, than were the barber pole, the pawnbroker's trio of balls and the medical cross & caduceus, but it falls in that category nonetheless. Anyway, this store, not far from the antique mall, is listed in the 2018 phonebook, so it either closed this year, or after listings closed last year.

I noticed the other day that this ABC storefront next to Solstice on Sparkleberry is now vacant. I had actually pulled
in there because I thought Solstice might be closed, but apparently it is just never open whenever I drive by..

Tony's Party Shop was on Saint Andrews Road in a Seven Oaks Shopping Center outparcel (not far from the former Irmo K-Mart).

Commenter Homer noted the closing, and sent in a set of pictures here. I took these two sets of pictures several weeks apart. The property is currently up for sale as shown in this listing

(Hat tip to commenter Homer)

UPDATE 27 April 2014 -- An earlier version of this post assumed the owner had passed away. Happily that seems to be wrong.

UPDATE 8 February 2017 -- These photos are from commenter Homer, who says:

I've attached 3 new pictures from Tony's Party Shop. I thought they were
getting ready to demolish it but it turns out they have gutted it to the
bare walls and have been working on the inside of the part that used to
be the actual liquor store. There's no signage anywhere so I have no
idea what may be in the works.

I noticed earlier this month that the little liquor store next to the Subway in the old Sears Plaza on Garners Ferry Road was going out of business. At the time of the first shot, they were doing fairly deep discounts, and by the time I got by there again at mid-month, they were already gone.

I noticed this little liquor shop in Irmo on Woodrow Street behind the Bi-Lo. It was raining a bit so I didn't get out and peer inside, but I believe that at this point they are still in close-out mode, though the space is already listed with a real-estate sign.

UPDATE 6 October 2021: Adding "North" to "Woodrow Street" in the title. Adding map icon.

Actually I'm not at all confident on a closing date for this little ABC store on Fairfield Road just north of I-20 as it does not appear in any phonebooks I have. However the place, while showing some wear, especially along the roofline, and sitting in a somewhat overgrown lot, is still in pretty good shape, so I'll go with late 2000s.

I like the name!

I had thought these two separate stores when I took the pictures, but closer inspection leads me to believe that while they may have been operated as seperately licensed businesses for ABC reasons, they shared one door (the door on the right of the Party Store side appears to be blocked off).

Both were in the little plaza at the corner of Leesburg Road and Greenlawn Drive which also housed the former Leonardo's Screen Printing and still very much open Pizza Palace.