443 S 5th Ave, Clarion, PA

Original Grocery Tenant: Quaker Market
Address: 443 S 5th Ave, Clarion, PA

Opened: 1968

Closed: 1972

Later Tenants: Comet Food Warehouse (1972-2019) > Faller's Furniture (2023- )
Photographed: July 1, 2023

Hope you had a great weekend! Today we're taking a look at the former Comet Food Warehouse in Clarion, PA, about 60 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. It was previously owned by a company called Jefferson Grocery, whose Clearfield location we saw on Friday. This store closed in 2019, following struggles with everything from road closures to union issues (a case was brought to the NLRB in 2017 and closed in 2018 regarding this store). Here's more coverage on the store's closure.

The store opened in 1968 as a Quaker Market, a chain or independent I know nothing about. Quaker closed just four years later when the store became a Comet Food Warehouse (store #12, in fact, and I have read elsewhere that Jefferson owned 13 stores in total at their peak).

Today, the store has very recently reopened as a new location of a furniture store that was previously in downtown Clarion.

Other than this store, Clarion has two other places to buy groceries -- a Walmart and an ALDI> We'll be seeing the latter tomorrow on The Market Report!