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In Greenville in the '80s and early '90s, I never went downtown (except to church). Nor did anyone else I knew. There was basically nothing there, other than offices, mostly.
So, random question: how did Woolworth's on N. Main Street survive so long? I believe that it closed in the late '90s.
Did any middle/upper-income people shop there? Was it just for people who worked downtown? Was it only for low-income people? It seemed kind of run down.
I can't really answer your question, but I worked on Main Street, about a block From Woolworths from 93-97.I had lunch there one time right before it closed, toasted egg salad and a pimento cheese I think.I'm pretty sure they closed in 96. By the end it was sort of an old worn out dollar type store, but you could still see signs that it was once something more.
The decline of downtown and rebirth took a total of about 30 years.I'm calling it 1970 until 2000.
Think about this, in the 70's you could go in Belk's on Main, got to the second floor, what is now Mast General's shoe dept and buy a shotgun, wow I'm getting old!
I remember Woolworth's so well, but the one in Coral Gables, FL...fond memories of the lunch counter, and horrid memories of my Grandmother yelling my name out to find me when she knew I was in the toy area!
IF Woolworths could survive DT when it was dead just imagine now how well a general merchandise store like an Urban sized Target would do now. I wonder which department store will be the first to realize they may want to return to downtown areas with smaller footprint stores with collection/return points for online orders. Many people are returning to live in DT's across the country so it would make sense that the department stores would follow as well.
In HS, I worked at Woolworth's in Park City Mall in Lancaster, PA in the mid 1990's. I guess you could say that I helped to make it what it is today.
Lancaster also had a downtown flagship Woolworth's store, which fit a very similar description to the downtown Greenville store at the end of its life.
We sold guns and ammo in that shopping mall store back in the 1990's. My, have times changed since then!
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