1941 N Decatur Blvd. Las Vegas NV 89108
Smith's Food & Drug (1980's)
This store and center were built by Maury Abrams of Encino California. Abrams built many if not most of the Las Vegas Smith's from the late 70's to early 80's.
This 40,000 sq. foot super store opened in 1981. Sales at this store and it's sister at Tropicana and Nellis (379) were disappointing. For much of the 80's, the stores both averaged $150k per week. Prior to it's closure, the expanding Las Vegas population had pushed 378 to a very profitable $250 a week.
The store had an older façade with windows lining the front wall. The interior had the original super store layout with a long non foods drug wall across the back. Walking the perimeter of the store right to left was the bulk foods department, small service deli serving only cold meats. A service meat counter and then a long aisle with deli items on the left and packaged meats on the right. The back of the store was the dairy case, drug wall and pharmacy. The left side was the produce department and then a separate liquor department.
What does the Lease really say? Responsibility of Continuous Occupancy.
Several first generation super stores built in the late 70's and early 80's, 373 (E. Flamingo), 374 (S. Nellis), 376 (W Tropicana) 378, 379 (E Tropicana), 380 (Green Valley) and 381 (Henderson) were built by Maury Abrams. Smith's third generation 70-80k square foot stores built in the 90's were nothing like the older super stores. The primary factor in expanding the stores square footage is often a zoning formula dictating the number of available parking spaces per the size of the project. Smiths replacement stores 351, 354 and 355 were built directly across the street from stores 373, 374 and 376 as the center couldn't expand parking. This decimated the older shopping centers viability as they lost the major anchor tenant. Abrams investments were turning very sour, very fast. Plans were on to close and replace the Henderson store when lawsuits filed by another developer (Smith's 368, W. Spring Mountain) and Abrams started showing results. Smith's enlarged and remodeled the existing store 381 (Boulder Hwy) rather than shutter it. This center did have enough parking to accommodate a 15k square foot store increase. I'm sure Smith's would have preferred to continue developing the SW Boulder Hwy \ Lake Mead project, though it had its critic as well. One of the suits was reportedly, and take this with a grain of salt, worth a million dollars in the early 90's.
In 2015, after Kroger, Smith's successor, closed the existing Food 4 Less, they purchased the property from Abrams successor LLC as the covenants now required Smith's to maintain continuous occupancy, which Kroger no longer wished to do.
Here is some good reading on this topic.
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA8366468&v=2.1&u=naal_asum&it=r&p=ITOF&sw=w&asid=fbf4b2be6f4d0643e4b111eb8289584c
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA8688590&v=2.1&u=naal_asum&it=r&p=ITOF&sw=w&asid=deeb241623096fca9bd2ac7a8d994be5
Pioneer Market and Buy N' Save (1990's-1996)
This was Smith's answer to being forced to reopen the store after it was closed prior to the grand opening of store 383 (Rancho and Craig). The store was closed for around 7 months and reopened as Pioneer Market. The Smith's Las Vegas district office ran a Las Vegas Sun weekly ad for this store and converted from Smith's to Pioneer stores 362 and 379. This concept at 378 and 379 was only worth 30k-40k a week versus the Smith's numbers of 250k a week. 362 was sold to Ed Myers (Myers Market) in 1992. 379 had it's own unique history as a J&J Market and a Food Giant as well as a Pioneer Market. It closed for good in 1996.
The spread of Costco in the 90's had Smith's worried. They reacted by taking an aisle in their stores and putting up warehouse racking calling the Costco size groceries the Big Deal section. Smith's then experimentally went a step further, recycling the Buy N' Save name, which had been used in Northern Utah on 5 discount concept stores, creating a mini (in theory only) Costco. 378 and store 22 on Wasatch Blvd in Salt Lake were the prototypes. The trial flopped and Smith's eventually closed the store for the 2nd time. The store only managed mid thirties per week as a Buy N Save.
Price Rite Grocery Warehouse and Food 4 Less . (Late 90's-2015)
When Smith's bought the bankrupt Megafoods stores in Las Vegas, they brought in a fresh team to run the stores. Those managers had started the Furr's Warehouse concept in Albuquerque. The Price Rite concept was an immediate success. So much so that by the time Kroger bought Smith's, there were 10 stores across Las Vegas, Phoenix and New Mexico.
In 1996, Price Rite passed on vacant store #379 (Tropicana and Nellis) but did a full remodel on store 378. They removed the windowed front and brought the store out about 6 feet. Reportedly, the new store 554 did mid 300k a week.
The Price Rite success came to end when Kroger transferred the stores to Ralph's Food 4 Less division.
Food 4 Less never really caught on the same as Price Rite and the Las Vegas stores all closed in December 2014. Interestingly, this location was never mentioned in any press releases about the closures. Most likely because Kroger wasn't allowed to close the store unless they bought the property.
Smart N Final +
Construction is progressing on a new Smart & Final Plus store. The planned grand opening is August 2015. Smart& Final has no relationship to Kroger (Smith's).
In the end, Smith's 378's successor, store 383 closed this year. Incidentally, 383 is another Abrams property. Great locations like 1941 N Decatur seem to live very long lives as grocery stores!
FYI - So you might ask, why is there a Smith's 378 in Reno? Beginning in the mid 90's with the then new Smith's 371 at 8555 West Sahara, they simply started reusing store numbers from closed stores. That might be my next post, where was it originally and where is it now. Stay tuned.
