Grocery Archaeology

Original Grocery Tenant: Bravo Supermarkets (?) Address: 1245 W 7th St, South Plainfield, NJ Opened:  1983 Closed:  2022 Later Tenants:  Tropical Supermarket (coming soon) Photographed:  March 3, 2023 Welcome back to South Plainfield! You may not remember our first visit here, so feel free to refresh your memory . Back in 2020, I saw an outdated, clearly struggling store and wondered how it was able to survive in that condition, not to mention with a smaller but better-run competitor all but across the street. Turns out it wasn't, and the store closed in 2022. Shortly thereafter, the landlord announced they had signed a lease with seven-store Key Food-affiliated chain Tropical Supermarkets. I visited in early March to find the store stripped of all of its Bravo branding, but no signage on the building itself. There was a sign at the end of the parking lot... ...but the massive sign for the strip mall had a giant blank panel at the top where the Bravo logo used to ...

Here's a little something to tide everyone over until The Market Report returns on January 1st! A few more random grocery bags from my own collection, following up on my first post on The Market Report. A pre-2002 ShopRite bag. Go fresh, go local with these Pathmark bags. Not sure on a year, but probably close to the final bankruptcy. I feel like I've posted this White Rose bag before, but you're gonna see it again anyway... And this one will be memorabilia soon enough, with LIDL's takeover of Long Island-based Best Market: Not a supermarket bag, but an old retail bag nonetheless: From the Elizabeth location. This one goes out to my friends at A&P Preservation . The 1990s Bravo logo makes an appearance on this bag. Not sure where it's from. And we're finishing up with this bag from Kings. I believe I posted this one previously but now we get to see both sides... Over and out for now. Happy holidays! Come back to The Market Re...