Orr's Food Center

This picture from Loopnet is the best picture I can find; unfortunately, it's the renovated version. It didn't use to look like this.

We've touched on Piggly Wiggly before, with the first local store in 1963 (well, under Piggly Wiggly Red River, anyway, apparently one existed a generation earlier in Bryan) and the fifth store they opened when Lewis & Coker departed from their space next to Kmart.

But an important part of Piggly Wiggly's growth in the area...before falling to an over-saturated market (the area was "overgroceried" in 1985, a chronic issue that would last into the 1990s with Winn-Dixie closing its College Station store for the same reason)...was Orr's. Waldon H. Orr got involved with Louis Mauro's Louis' Market at Main Street and 23rd Street in 1939 (324 Main Street, a small storefront by today's standards) and in April 1948 opened a comparatively modern store at 200 East 24th Street, featuring just 8,500 square feet of space. At the time, Orr's Food Center was the largest grocery store in town (a record that has been continuously been broken). A few years later, Orr opened a second store at 3516 S. Texas Avenue and in the 1960s completed an expansion that almost doubled the size of the store, to approximately 12,000 square feet. While the downtown location remained as Orr's Food Center, the second location was referred to as Orr's Minimax, a franchised operation of stores that was owned by wholesaler Fleming Company Incorporated¹. In 1971, both Orr's stores were sold to Piggly Wiggly Red River Co., Inc., a large Piggly Wiggly franchisee operation out of Shreveport with stores from Austin to Baton Rouge² and stretching up to Missouri, which simply rebranded the Orr's stores as its own name (you can see Orr's in Piggly Wiggly form here). In the early 1980s Piggly Wiggly Red River either collapsed or otherwise sold its stores to Six Star Foods, a consortium of local businessmen, at which point consisting of just the two former Orr's, the former Lewis & Coker store, the Hearne store, and a store in Rockdale. Six Star Foods ceased operations in December 1985. The first to go was the Rockdale store (closed within a matter of months), then the one next to Kmart, and lastly this location, along with it the other Bryan location (the Hearne store was sold to Malone & Hyde³).

In 1986 Frank and Pete Palasota reopened the store as Pal's Supermarket. Pal's rearranged the store to make the shelves lower and easier to get around the store (with making multiple half-aisles instead of longer ones) but I think this was just a way to stock less merchandise. Pal's was unfortunately a failure, closing sometime in late 1987 with little fanfare. If Six Star Foods couldn't keep Piggly Wiggly afloat with the competition, Pal's couldn't do better. Pal's was mentioned as one of the participating retailers of a Brazos Food Bank food drive³ and the last mention of it was in March 1987 when a 67-year-old man drove into the parking lot in his truck and took his own life.

Not too long after (I suspect Pal's sold the lease and quietly closed) A.B.E. Systems, an office supplies dealer took up the space but it must have left something behind as references appear in 1998 for an antiques store called "A Bygone Era", and in 1999, "A Better Environment".

By 2005, it was divided into two smaller medical suites, with an otolaryngologist taking up residence (David Suchowiecky, MD) and chiropractor David Bailey, DC, in the other (d/b/a Back & Joint Clinic), and by 2007 the ENT doctor had been replaced by Lone Star Legal Aid. By December 2012 it was Infinity Real Estate & Management and by 2016, Wayne Carroll Enterprises (looks like the corporate office of The Chocolate Gallery, if that's the same business).

By 2022 the building had been renovated, losing the original architectural features like the glazed glass blocks of Orr's and had smaller tenants. With the East 24th facade divided into 200, 202, and 204 (200-202 having AB Hormone Therapy, 204 having St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store and the Tabor side also getting sub-divided, with 307 North Tabor Road getting a branch of Engel & Völkers, and 311 North Tabor Road getting Dirt Road Home, it seems that at least the building has a future ahead of it, but there's nothing at the site to remind visitors to downtown Bryan of what was once the town's largest, most modern grocery store.

1. For more information on Minimax, please see Houston Historic Retail. Fleming (later Fleming Companies starting around 1981) will also figure a bit into this story.
2. Piggly Wiggly was never truly a chain, it franchised its name and format, much like a fast food franchise. Both H-E-B and Winn-Dixie were originally Piggly Wiggly franchisees.
3. Memphis-based Malone & Hyde were the owners of the Piggly Wiggly brand at the time and based out of Memphis. Besides being the one-time owner of Piggly Wiggly, its biggest success was Auto Shack, founded in 1978 and spun off in 1986 (renamed AutoZone in 1987 due to a lawsuit by Tandy Corporation). Malone & Hyde (and by extension Piggly Wiggly) were sold to Fleming Companies in 1988, and in 2003 C&S Wholesale Grocers got the brand in Fleming Companies' bankruptcy.
4. The others included the "big three" at the time, Safeway, Kroger, and Winn-Dixie...plus 7-Eleven.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I'm in the middle of another project that I hope will be a big thing (can't reveal too much of it right now) but as part of that, Kettle and Fort Shiloh got big updates. Pay attention to the Confucius Chinese Cuisine page as well...that's also to receive a major update, hopefully coming by October 6th.

Aggieland Outfitters

Picture by author, April 2014. I had to touch it up to make visible.
Moving down University Drive to University Drive East from our last post we get to 303 University Drive East. (All these years later and I still have University Drive East photos from 2014...and more to come!). I wanted to briefly touch on this Aggieland Outfitters location as part of phasing out the Carbon-izer.com City Directories (of College Station-Bryan). Originally, there were two buildings here, and Aggieland Outfitters opened in 303A University Drive East in 2010 (there were two other locations; one on George Bush Drive, the other at Post Oak Mall). A few years later (2013), both buildings were torn down for a new Aggieland Outfitters store. New parking was soon added after that, but it was reconfigured (mostly torn up) to build a new office building to replace the parent company location (Kalcorp Enterprises) at Graham Road. I can't find too much on the original pre-2013 buildings as they were mostly intended for non-retail use from the looks of it. In 1984, 303-B was home to Sun Shield Applications, in 1993 and 2001 WTA Leasing (apartment locator service) and I can't find anything for 303-A. This Yelp review suggests it might have been a dental office at one point which would make sense...if the review wasn't from 2018. In any case, the former buildings are one of the things in town that I still know little about.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Recently I went back and updated Taco Villa's article which goes over its history as Del Taco and Quick as a Flash. And always, if you like this blog, don't forget to donate!

University Book Store on Northgate

There have been a few changes since this June 2013 picture (picture by author), Domino's changed its font, its logo, and painted the building tan, Potbelly changed the logo and is now "Potbelly Sandwich Shop". Oh and Starbucks closed!
By now you may have heard that Starbucks at 409 University Drive is closing. With this blog's current policy on what can be included, that would qualify it alone, but it goes back farther than that. From what I can tell the building was built in the late 1950s per Brazos CAD hosting Shaffer's at 409 Sulphur Springs and a few other tenants, most notably in the 411 space where Starbucks later lived for years. (I have heard the original tenant was a second location of a Bryan jewelry store called Varner's, but have yet to verify that).

In any case, at the 409 space was Shaffer's, a bookstore that had other items like music, hobbyist items (boats, cars, and airplanes), and a few other items.¹ By 1967 the store had become Shaffer's University Book Store and by 1973 had dropped the Shaffer's moniker. University Book Store didn't occupy the entire space during its nearly fifty-year lifespan. Aside from the supposed Varner's location, in 1969, 411 University became home to the A&M Agency of the National Farm Life Insurance Company and in the early 1980s changed hands to The Yogurt Pump, a frozen yogurt shop (possibly the first of its kind in College Station). The parent company of The Yogurt Pump, Lone Star Yogurt Company, retooled the business for fall 1983 as Sweetlix Creamery (after actually going under the Lone Star Yogurt Company name in summer 1983), but that closed in 1984 and reopened in fall 1984 as Mignone's Italian Ices (which also sold some pasta dishes too). By 1986 it was going as Mignone's of Philadelphia (was there even a Mignone's in Philadelphia? Who knows!). After 1986 there's no more references to it; I guess University Book Store did absorb the extra space.

From what I can tell around 2001 they sub-leased a portion to Domino's Pizza (which moved from their old location at 1504 Holleman Drive (part of that was to help move them closer to the university, as their 3104 Texas Avenue South location was doing business in College Station) and the whole chain collapsed (with their other locations like their University Drive East store and their extremely short-lived Wellborn Road location) in early 2006. After it closed, part of it was filled with Domino's, which moved from their old location at 1504 Holleman Drive (part of that was to help move them closer to the university, as their 3104 Texas Avenue South location was doing business in most of the growing south College Station area).

The vacant space was redeveloped in time for fall 2006 with Potbelly Sandwich Works as it was called back then (now it's just Potbelly Sandwich Shop2) occupying most of the space and the corner hosting Starbucks Coffee in August 2006. (It was the second "real" Starbucks in town after the opening of the Texas Avenue and Holleman location which was the first).

The Starbucks would operate for the next 19 years but in September 2025 it would announce its closure effective on the 27th. Despite being the most easily accessible Starbucks to foot traffic, the store had its challenges. It closed early (7 pm, not good for late-night studying), wasn't really unique anymore (as licensed Starbucks now operate throughout the campus), had what was likely the highest rent among the other stores, lacked a drive-through (only the 2002 Holleman/Texas location lacks a drive-through, and that has lower rent...plus parking). Plus, it's just not unique anymore. It was fun when it was one of only two Starbucks shops in town, but now (after this closure) there will still be nine others, all located strategically around town. It is still Northgate though, so I expect it to be replaced with something, perhaps another coffee shop or cafe, in short order.

1. Shaffer's had moved from a smaller location.
2. It should be noted that earlier in September, Potbelly announced its sale to convenience store/gas station operator RaceTrac but I didn't think that to be significant enough to be included in the prose.

What was on Texas Avenue before Super 8?

A nice picture of the original 301 Texas courtesy The Eagle. Note the Red Barn Cafe behind it.

Will I ever run out of things to talk about on Texas Avenue? Not yet! Much like the Fairfield Inn next to it (well, it's Best Western as of this writing), the College Station Super 8 was a 1990s redevelopment of older businesses on that lot. While the Fairfield Inn, er, Best Western, is in Bryan, the Super 8 (301 Texas Avenue South) is in College Station. But before we get to the Super 8 there's what needs to be covered before that.

301 Texas Avenue was originally A-1 Auto Parts when it opened in 1976, a NAPA parts dealership, but closed in the mid-1980s to be replaced with Brazos Valley Small Engine in spring 1986, which then became Aggie Solar Guard in 1989 (renamed to Ag Solar Guard by late 1990) but in 1993 it relocated to 3410 S. Texas Avenue. (More on that another time.)

But of course, before A-1 Auto Parts, one door down was a business originally home to Tastee-Freez. Tastee-Freez was here starting in 1957 to the early 1970s. Tastee-Freez counted about 1,800 units in the 1950s and 1960s but imploded as they couldn't control franchises. (Good luck finding a Tastee-Freez that's not part of a Wienerschnitzel or Original Hamburger Stand). Tastee-Freez (315 Texas Avenue S., but I have seen the address given as 209 originally) soon gave way to Discount Liquor No. 2 around 1971-1972, and by 1974 was home to The Grapevine (see this post). By 1977 The Grapevine had moved for The Senter-Piece (a floral shop). Despite this rapid changeover in tenants, the Tastee-Freez was still on many peoples' mind and the Grapevine mentioned it was in the former building. The Senter-Piece closed in 1981 and by 1983 it had given way to Brazos Valley Pools & Spas which seems to be unrelated to both a 1999 business off Highway 21 and the current (since 2008) Brazos Valley Pools & Spas mentioned when this site covered Barry Pool Company down near the end. A few years after that the pool company, it was campaign offices for Peter Geren's 1986 run for office, then became Discount Bike Company (also known as Discount Bike Repair) which operated from 1987 to 1993. (There isn't much on Discount Bike Company other than one ad at the very end selling Rollerblades). Discount Bike Company was the last tenant here, closing in 1993.

I've never been to the local Super 8 before, so I can't say much on it (looking around on the Internet it does say there are 89 rooms on three floors). It did receive a new logo after 2008 when then-parent company Wyndham Worldwide changed the logo...and sometime around 2024-2025 received red accents on the exterior.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Despite the recent slow-down in schedule there's more to check out! For example, we updated the Kettle article to account for the demise of Salad and Go, there's more beyond the limits of Brazos County at Numbered Exits and of course don't forget to donate on Ko-fi, we have a goal now!