For years, there's been a "Carbon-izer.com" button at the top, and I've decided that to better serve this site I should integrate those a bit better. What I've essentially done is created a whole webpage for everything on Texas Avenue that does NOT have a blog post, and for most of it, never will. The Texas Avenue page, as of this writing, will be updated by the end of the month (yes, it does have some rough edges), but also serves as a landing page for all the other categories that fit into it. I verified everything below to go in...couldn't find [bars and nightclubs] though...and more will likely be added.
This page is not on the Index.
Because of the limitations of Blogger, this particular post just covers brands. More pages to cover soon.
Tags currently on this post:
Exxon,UtoteM,Circle K,AutoZone,Church's Chicken,Dairy Queen,Texaco,McDonald's,Whataburger,Starbucks Coffee,Sonic,Taco Bell,O'Reilly Auto Parts,Dollar General,Shell,7-Eleven,Conoco,CVS,Enco,Max Food Mart
Showing posts with label Starbucks Coffee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Starbucks Coffee. Show all posts
Friday, June 5, 2026
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
University Book Store on Northgate
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.
Friday, December 4, 2015
Pooh's Park, Tinsley's, and Others Replaced by a Shopping Center
Once again, we come back to one of our blog, this time to roll a few smaller posts into a bigger one. As the picture above shows, the area at Holleman and Texas Avenue is now a large (kind of low end) shopping center. In addition to covering all the changes that went on there (which I have yet to do), I can combine a few older posts into this one. So, first, we have Pooh's Park at 1907 Texas Avenue South.
There's far more to Pooh's Park (no, not related to the "Winnie" one) I can get into today, because it's a popular topic on local nostalgia threads: if you want to learn more, you can head over to Facebook to talk or browse through old photos (and they include newspaper articles!)
I never got to experience Pooh's Park myself, but from what I've seen and read, it was like Chuck E. Cheese, Putt-Putt, and a skating rink (roller, not ice) all wrapped into one. It opened in 1972 and was where the shopping center where Hobby Lobby, Big Lots, and Ross are now. A 1984 phone book has a different ad that does mention things like a water slide (408 feet) and a different address (at some point, they changed to 105 Holleman Drive East, though based on what you can see from Google Earth, and backed up by a picture of Texas Avenue from a local history book I don't have a copy of with me) is that Pooh's Park was accessed primarily through Texas Avenue, not Holleman.
One thing about Pooh's Park was that it had higher standards to keep rowdier customers away, demanding that "kids dress properly and keep and their hair trimmed" but during the height of its popularity that didn't matter much. Pooh's Park closed in November 1986 citing taxes and insurance reasons as well as a dwindling customer base. Things were left on the property (including a theft of a "blue furry robot" ultimately just the sign remained up by the early 2000s.
Some older maps (circa 2001-ish, long after Pooh's Park bit the dust) put a "Pooh's Lane" roughly where the Bahama Buck's is now, but unless that first part of Holleman Drive East was actually called that (after all, there's a few things that do support that, including the odd alignment of Holleman Drive and Holleman Drive East suggests that the East part was first, and then Holleman Drive extended that way later by way of a particularly awkward curve, or the fact that the subdivision nearby (behind the strip center and the other businesses on the east side) is named Pooh's Park Subdivision.
Opening in late 1979, Tinsley's was located on 1905 Texas Avenue South as the chain's only College Station location (there were locations from Waco to Houston, and two in Bryan--one of which has an article on the blog). In 1985, the Tinsley family sold out to Church's Fried Chicken. Church's closed sometime around 1989 (likely due to the Church's/Popeyes merger at the time). In the 1995 it reopened as Santa Fe Pizza (aka Santa Fe Market Cafe). In 1997, it was Kokopelli's (Southwestern food, I have a menu but never scanned it) and Clay Oven from 1998 to 2000 (Indian food).
It should be noted the plane was a real thing, though, as David Tinsley used an actual 1930s plane to promote his restaurants, not unlike how Flying Tomato used hot air balloons.
Despite a brief re-appearance in Huntsville with much fanfare (in a former KFC and now Hartz Chicken Buffet), Tinsley's is current a dead chain once more.
Anyway, by the early 2000s, the space was almost entirely vacant (I believe Clay Oven had been demolished) with little else on the property except the old Pooh's Park sign, which had remained up. While the new shopping center (opened in 2002) had rather downscale tenants, most of them were new. There was Hobby Lobby, which moved from Post Oak Square, locating at 1903 Texas Avenue South. Others included a branch of Loupot's (1907 Texas Ave. S.), Shoe Carnival (1909 Texas Ave. S.), Ross Dress for Less (1911 Texas Ave. S.), and Goody's Family Clothing (1913 Texas Avenue South). Petco and a few smaller stores shared the 1901 address, and in 2006, CiCi's Pizza moved in from Culpepper Plaza, taking the 1905 Texas Avenue address. Goody's would close in early 2009 as the chain went under, but it was replaced with a few new stores, Big Lots (returning back to the market, as by that time, their old location at the former Kmart had been closed for several years) and a Twin Liquors (which, despite slightly nicer décor, seemed like a smaller, inferior competitor to Spec's). Loupot's also closed in spring 2012 and reopened as a Salata in less than two years.
Another shopping strip was built around the same time as the rest (but named The Shops at Wolf Pen Plaza) with Starbucks Coffee, a Sprint store (which initially had the older logo, then eventually was rebranded to T-Mobile following the merger), and Champion Firearms (moved from the Kroger shopping center). The Starbucks can be seen in its early days here from Starbucks Everywhere. It shows the ratty little building next door, the trees along Texas Avenue that got wrecked when it was widened, Goody's, and the patio of Starbucks before it was expanded. A comfortable reminder of days gone by, really.
UPDATE 07-08-2022: QoL updates including the life of the center, better closing date of Pooh's, new tags
UPDATE 06-12-2025: Various updates and mild rewrite.
UPDATE 11-02-2025: Big Lots closed around late 2024 (probably should've mentioned that in the last update) but as of this writing Sprouts Farmers Market is coming. This is the third time in over a decade they've tried (back in 2012 they were going to move into the dead Linens 'n Things on University Drive East, and later planned a move into the dead World Market down the street, though this wasn't as well publicized).
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
FedMart
Before Wal-Mart...before Kmart...there was FedMart. Founded in 1954 in San Diego by Sol Price and later had concepts "borrowed" by the late Sam Walton, including the "Mart" suffix1, FedMart arrived in College Station in November 1973, just a few months before Kmart did.
By the time FedMart opened in College Station, the name was a bit of a misnomer (originally a membership-only store for government employees), but it was a large, modern store open to all. The store featured "one-stop shopping" including not only apparel, sporting goods, appliances (even heavy appliances), and other dry goods, but groceries as well. (It also appears to have lacked a bakery and deli). The November 7th, 1973 edition of The Eagle ran a huge 12-page multi-page guide/ad for the store for the store's big opening on November 8th, mostly talking about FedMart's features (but did not include a map). An auto center/gas station was to open in early 1974. FedMart had a bit of unusual merchandise mix, having both discount store items and food, but not a large selection of either. The grocery component was heavily advertised but only offered a few brands or sizes of a given item that a full supermarket would carry more of, even by 1973 supermarket standards, and lacked a lot of the features that a full supermarket would have (no bakery or deli). The College Station store was part of a small handful of stores opened by the company in the Houston area, as in this era, FedMart had picked up numerous sites from Globe, a discount store operated by Walgreens.
The development also straightened out Tarrow with a new road that connected to University called Fed Mart Drive and cutting off the "old Tarrow" portion that curved around toward the back.
I don't have a picture of FedMart when it was operating, but given an old early '80s map depicts the now-closed store as looking almost exactly like one of the San Antonio stores, it's assumed that the College Station looked like it too.
FedMart's time in College Station would only be for less than a decade, perhaps owing to upper management's merchandising decisions (based out of Germany starting in the late 1970s) to expand to a full "hypermarket", which didn't really work in most of the locations (and the concept was largely untested in the United States). Maybe it was just the fact that at the time, the warehouse foods + discount store concept was not as effective as just having a more full-featured discount store like Wal-Mart and Kmart did. In any case, the College Station store, along with all the other stores in the Texas area (San Antonio, Dallas, Houston, Victoria, etc.) closed in November 1981. The chain's Arizona and California stores went out of business less than a year later.
While the building would never be used by a single retail tenant, it was purchased by local investors and converted into Chimney Hill Shopping Center. The first tenants of these would be Kettle and Hillside Lanes, a bowling alley. Kettle #145 would ultimately close just a few years later but with its opening, for a brief time the area had FIVE Kettle restaurants, all open 24 hours—next to Rodeway Inn, a former Denny's restaurant, the College Station location, and the one near campus.
Unlike the other four restaurants, which stood alone, both Hillside Lanes and Kettle would open into each other. (While Kettle was a bit of a nostalgic experience in the 2010s, a smoky diner connected to a bowling alley sounds like a VERY different experience). Western Beverages moved into the old FedMart Service Center building at the corner of Fed Mart Drive (renamed Tarrow Street East within a few years) and University Drive East. The transformation into Chimney Hill Shopping Center (aka Chimney Hill Retail Plaza) started in late 1983 a 70-foot tall landmark sign was erected to serve as the signage for a brand-new shopping center. That same month it was announced that the Western Beverages would be evicted and remodeled for the new Bryan-College Station Chamber of Commerce building (later known as 715 University Drive East).
The name of the center was named after a nearby development of mixed-use development built off Tarrow with townhomes and small office suites (the alley off Arguello Drive serves both). By December 1983 David Gardner's Jewelers was operating in the building (it was here at least into the early 1990s). Soon after, Chimney Hill Bowling Center opened. There was also a new addition to the FedMart building that housed the relocated Western Beverages.
Hillside Lanes closed in December 1983 but quickly reopened as Chimney Hill Bowling Center (within a few days).2 In 1990 the bowling alley closed3 and most of the building continued to be a rotating selection of smaller tenants, with the exception of Western Beverages, the second restaurant space, and a second outlot built in the parking lot. This second outlot (besides the Chamber of Commerce) was built as Fletcher's Original State Fair Corny Dogs, which had several small locations in Texas but by the late 1980s they had closed.4 This was briefly (for a few months) Burger Express, then Dogs & Such until 2000.5 From 2002 to September 2010, a location of Shake's Frozen Custard operated in the spot, but after its closure the building was demolished.
The restaurant space (with the address of 707 University Drive East)6 started out as Bill Edge's "Confederate House" restaurant in early 1984 (back when a name like was socially acceptable as Southern hospitality and heritage, and not demonized like it is today), based after a Houston restaurant. Part of the problem was that the area was in recession when it opened, and a "top of the line" steakhouse as it was put was a tough sell in the economy. A name update to "Confederate House '85" and new management (likely other changes as well) didn't help turn things around, nor did another retool (changing it to "Tradition Restaurant & Bar") saved the restaurant. It closed around late 1986 or early 1987. By August 1987, there was another restaurant, Cafe d'Amerique, operating in the space.
Rembrandt's opened in 1992 after a period of vacancy (doesn't seem like there was anything after Cafe d'Amerique, which closed in spring 1988) and closed in 1994...and then The Tavern on Chimney Hill opened in 1997 in suite 406 and operated until 2000. Finally, in 2007, The Republic Steakhouse opened in the spot. Shortly afterward, however, in 2008, the City of College Station purchased the strip center as part of a failed bid to build a large hotel/conference center in the spot.7 The early 2010s saw the center start clearing out (Western Beverages went away around as late as early 2014, I seem to recall) and in 2016 demolition began not long after the City gave up on the space and sold it to developers. The idea was The Republic could stay as the lot was redeveloped and be a part of the new development, but plans shifted again and it would move to a new building on the site. (There was also talk of a Black Walnut Cafe being a major tenant). By this point in time, the Chamber of Commerce building had moved out to a new location on Highway 6 (the move happened around 2013-2014) with 2016 seeing the demolition of the structure minus The Republic building, which itself had been new construction. The original FedMart building was gone.
By 2019 new businesses had taken its place. The Republic moved into a new spot at the southwest side of the property (with a bar-within-a-restaurant, Primrose Path). A new Starbucks opened in March 2020 (moving from down the street) with a strip center beginning business soon after, soon filled out with the likes of Five Guys, FedEx Office (opened in early 2022 and moving from its longtime Northgate home), Charles Schwab, and Snooze: An AM Eatery. Drury Plaza Hotel (705 University Dr. East) opened for business around early 2025. In November 2025, Sakura, a Japanese restaurant opened a new building (713 University Drive East) right about where The Republic used to be, sharing its strip mall building with hair salon Drybar.
1. The rest of the concept was lifted liberally from New England chain Ann & Hope, which Wal-Mart forced out of business in 2001. 2. I'm not sure how the Kettle space was reused.
3. I feel like I read somewhere that the lanes were moved to the MSC but I may be remembering how Wolf Pen's skating rink was moved from Bryan.
4. There was another location on Gessner Road in Houston. While no longer a Fletcher's, the building is still the same, and looked identical to the College Station location.
5. A second location opened on Texas Avenue at the short-lived Red Line location.
6. Officially this was 701 University Drive East Suite 406.
7. There were of course, other tenants over the years but I've already covered the major ones. Some of the lesser tenants that were mentioned in the older version of this post included the 1993 tenants like A&M Travel Service, Beneficial Texas Inc. (insurance), Chimney Hill Florist & Gifts, and Qualice Network Services.
UPDATE 01-28-2026: A long-awaited redo of the post has been created, from a new picture to current events to more chronological ordering and so on.
UPDATE 01-30-2026: As the most recent rewrite was sitting in the backlog for a few years before I decided to finish it, there were some things that didn't quite make the cut. Some things from an old "new" draft included an article about the 2013 plan and confirms that Western Beverages was still there as of 2013. The new Republic restaurant opened in December 2018 allowing for the demolition of the old building, and a few more tenants that I didn't previously mentioned. There was "Whoops Bar & Grill" (which I got from a tax listing, and did not seem to open under that name if it all), Tonix/Metro/The Lounge (operated in the last half of the 2000s, a nightclub with three concepts operating simultaneously), A&M Travel Service, Total Tan, Reflections Hair Design, Qualice Network Services, Points Plus, EPI Center, JE & R Finance Inc., Custom Operating Systems Inc., 11th Frame, and Pacific Garden (1986-1990, this may have been in the Kettle's space...though wouldn't have opened into the bowling alley). I had also taken the time to mention that I went into the Chamber of Commerce building a few times to get the latest city map, which I remember being fascinated with as a kid as it included "new" streets, some of which were later built (Highway 40) and some of which weren't (Jones-Butler Road extending south from Holleman but looping and connecting with Southwest Parkway)...which I'm not sure was ever on the books.
UPDATE 07-10-2026: [Starbucks Coffee] added to the post.
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