How does St. Louis work? (Manchester, Clayton: houses, neighborhoods, buying)

[stlcitygirl]

Most of my neighborhood works downtown as well as almost all my friends. I am super jealous of their commute. Not sure where the OP was looking, but there are at least 20 large grocery stores in the city. I can count at least 5 Schnucks off the top of my head. There are at least a dozen or so Shop and Saves. There is a Trader Joes right on the city line in Brentwood. I prefer going to the small neighborhood grocers and farmer's markets. Soulard Farmers market is open year round and has most of what you need.
-To the OP, there are about 6 business centers: Downtown, Central West End, Clayton, Westport, Maryland Heights, Earth City, plus smaller ones throughout St Charles and Chesterfield. So the jobs are spread out throughout the region. I would say the majority are Downtown and Clayton.
-There are several malls throughout the area, the Galleria sits on the city limits and is very popular. The metrolink will drop you off right by it. It has every major store you could want. There are several other malls spread throughout the suburbs. There is great boutique shopping in the Central West End, The Loop and Clayton. There are several independent stores spread throughout the city in the different neighborhoods.

[1greatcity]

Originally Posted by It'sAutomatic

This is a very open-ended question, but hear me out. I took a visit to St. Louis recently and liked it. What I don't quite get about the place is how it functions, so to speak. To explain, for instance, I biked through ALL of South city and some of north, and saw only two large grocery stores and only saw a few smaller ones, and one of the large ones was a Family Dollar or some other low-stock discount store on Gravois. I also didn't see much local employment. In Chicago there are buildings dedicated to shops and light industry lining each of the dedicated busy streets that are located 1/2 mile apart. In St. Louis, from my observations, there are few areas like that. There are industrial lofts downtown and along the riverfront, but certainly not enough to employ the entire city.

What I got from St. Louis is just miles and miles of very attractive residential streets, and not much else. Where do people work, buy groceries, shop for clothes, etc? I don't mean to diss your city. It seems to fit me, since I left with an itch to move there. I'm just trying to understand it better, hear some people's experiences with the city and all that. It's definitely quite different from Chicago, where I have lived my whole life.

You biked through ALL of South St Louis? Um, not possible. There are literally hundreds of miles of roads on the south side. This expains why you only saw a couple large grocery stores.
I live on the south side, and there are literally 4 large grocery stores and numerous small ones within a mile of my home.

[storey13]

Originally Posted by aragx6

I would definitely count Shop N Saves as well. I think there's a couple in the city and I know there's one just on the outskirts in Maplewood. While they're not the nicest grocery store chain in St. Louis, I've had much better luck at them than many Jewels in Chicago. Actually once you live in St. Louis you'll be very disappointed in other places grocery stores. Ours are super nice and very well priced.

Most city residents I know make a trip out to Richmond Heights for a major shopping trip every once in a while. There you'll find a Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, all the big box shopping you could ever need including a Nordstrom Rack and a Crate and Barrel, a really nice Dierbergs. While that's not technically in the city limits, that's only because St. Louis' city limits are so itty bitty. Unless you live on the far north or south sides, you're likely only 5-15 minutes from that whole shopping corridor. And there's even a metro stop if you're carless.

South St. Louis is very residential -- you definitely got that right, but there are so many industrial and light industrial areas not just along the riverfront, but west of the city. A lot of folks work at plants up near the Airport -- that's where Boeing employs over 15k employees.

When I moved to Chicago from St. Louis I realized how similar they were as cities, just on a significantly larger scale. You've just got to go the other way.

I loved Chicago -- really didn't ever want to leave. But things don't always work out as you planned and while we're in KC for the moment, the next step for us is almost certainly St. Louis. For the longest time I figured I just loved this town so much because I'm from here, but my SO (who's from KC) has fallen in love with it too. Great urban, walkable neighborhoods with just enough rust belt grit to keep us interested, but gorgeous homes at affordable prices and a slightly slower pace than Chicago. Perfect mix for us, and possibly for you too!

Regardless, I think St. Louis has so much to offer and is so underrated. We're all happy to share more insights about this place!

It really is true regarding the grocery stores in St. Louis. Since I left the area in 2001, I have been greatly disappointed in most grocery stores. I currently live in Oak Park, IL (near west-side suburb of Chicago), and the grocery stores up here are awful. Jewel and Dominicks don't even compare to the major players in St. Louis. The one exception I have found is the Publix chain, which has stores in the southeast region of the U.S.

I have been trying to talk my spouse into moving back to St. Louis area for years now, and it is possible that a new possible opportunity might finally seal the deal. The main drawback for her is we both have too many relatives that live there!

After years of living in Nashville, and now the Chicago area, I too yearn to move back to the area I grew up in. There is just something about the area that draws me in.

[piloting]

Originally Posted by It'sAutomatic

This is a very open-ended question, but hear me out. I took a visit to St. Louis recently and liked it. What I don't quite get about the place is how it functions, so to speak. To explain, for instance, I biked through ALL of South city and some of north, and saw only two large grocery stores and only saw a few smaller ones, and one of the large ones was a Family Dollar or some other low-stock discount store on Gravois. I also didn't see much local employment. In Chicago there are buildings dedicated to shops and light industry lining each of the dedicated busy streets that are located 1/2 mile apart. In St. Louis, from my observations, there are few areas like that. There are industrial lofts downtown and along the riverfront, but certainly not enough to employ the entire city.

What I got from St. Louis is just miles and miles of very attractive residential streets, and not much else. Where do people work, buy groceries, shop for clothes, etc? I don't mean to diss your city. It seems to fit me, since I left with an itch to move there. I'm just trying to understand it better, hear some people's experiences with the city and all that. It's definitely quite different from Chicago, where I have lived my whole life.

I understand what you're talking about. As a lifelong resident of St. Charles, knowing that with the help of a car I can find a great variety of stores and restaurants, it shocks me when I'm in St. Louis neighborhoods and see very few options for shopping, outside of a few select areas. For example, living in old midtown-St. Charles, I have 2 large grocery stores (Schnucks and Dierbergs, not to mention Walmart, Sam's, 2 Walgreens and many Gas Stations) within 10 minutes of my house. I also have a mid-size Schnucks and a small IGA less than 10 minutes from my house. When I drive to some parts of the city say, the Tower Grove area, I at least get the impression that the shopping choices are both not as good and not as convenient. I imagine for someone driving through North City, the impression of few shopping choices would be especially grim. Downtown finally has Culinaria, but by the standards of most St. Louisans, Culinaria seems like a concession, not a real solution. If we talk about other kinds of shopping, the impression might be worse, especially for someone coming from Chicago. Considering my shopping choices in St. Charles, a city of 60,000, compared to St. Louis a much larger city of over 300,000, it doesn't *feel* like St. Louis has an adequate number of shops.

[aragx6]

Dude what? Culinaria is awesome.

[piloting]

It scores high on the cool factor, in that it's the only decent grocery store downtown, and it has a nice urban atmosphere, but when I compare Culinaria to any of the large Schnucks or Dierbergs that I'm familiar with, and which are plentiful in St. Louis, I'm a little disappointed. I would like to see more Culinaria-size stores in the denser parts of the city, but considering the excellent large grocery stores we have, pretty much everywhere else, Culinaria just feels like a fun experiment, not a solid solution.

[aragx6]

What have you not been able to find there that you need? Or is it just the size?

[piloting]

I guess I'm just used to having enormous selection, being spoiled by my large Schnucks and Dierbergs, supplemented by Shop N Save, Save a Lot, Walgreens, Aldi, etc., which are all convenient to me. Perhaps the inadequacy of one store is then saved by the selection in a nearby store, but Culinaria is kinda on its own, and so I tend to see it as a giant, albeit fancy, convenience store, for people who don't have time to drive somewhere with a better selection. I've only been there a few times, never for full-scale grocery shopping. It served my needs well, though its pharmacy did not have the eye drops I wanted, when any Walgreens or normal large grocery store would have them. I'm saying it serves most everyday needs, and it's *adequate* but downtown St. Louis needs/deserves more than adequate. It's easy to imagine a visitor from a larger city, like Chicago, coming downtown and after seeing Culinaria, saying "that's it?"

[aragx6]

^Then I know you haven't been to Chicago. As stated in the posts above they truly have some of the worst grocery stores I've ever seen and none downtown at all except for wildly, ridiculously expensive places like Treasure Island.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, but I've shopped at that Culinaria a fair amount and found it to be well more than adequate.

[piloting]

Okay, okay, Culinaria's fine. But it could use some competition downtown. A Trader Joe's would be nice, and demographically appropriate considering the price of some of the condos and rentals popping up. I'm not familiar with what exactly counts as downtown Chicago, but there was a busy Trader Joe's across the street from my hotel off the Magnificent Mile. That being said, I must edit what I said about visitors from Chicago because after some quick research, given the population density of downtown Chicago, the grocery options seem inadequate. Perhaps that's why that Trader Joe's was so busy. :/