Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

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ClownLoach
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by ClownLoach »

Retailuser wrote: March 7th, 2022, 10:19 pm
ClownLoach wrote: March 7th, 2022, 10:05 pm
storewanderer wrote: March 6th, 2022, 6:23 pm
There have been a couple Ralphs closures in Huntington Beach:

6942 Warner - appears to have closed around 2011 (maybe it was too close to 5241 Warner)



10081 Adams (which was a Ralphs Marketplace) that closed in 2016. That was probably one of the last new build Ralphs Stores (or at least one of the last 5 new build Ralphs Stores)... Whole Foods took that building over. I don't think that store failed as Ralphs.
There were way too many Ralphs in that area of West Huntington Beach/HB Harbor. At one point they had 5 including 3 on Warner in about a 3 mile stretch.


-Warner "Meadowlark" (now flagship Fresh Fare, still open)
-Goldenwest and Garfield (newer store too close to Goldenwest and Warner, now a slow Fresh Fare)
-Beach and Garfield (closed shortly after opening of Goldenwest and Garfield, then Stein Mart, just grand opened as small format Target)
-Goldenwest and Warner (now Sprouts and the old oval Ralphs sign tower is still there with a Sprouts logo)
-Warner in Huntington Harbour (converted Hughes, now Trader Joe's).

They effectively have gone from 5 stores in the area down to 2. Albertsons/Vons in the same time has gone from 3 stores... to 3.
Do you know when the goldenest and warner store closed?
It had to be after I moved to AZ.
I think it closed around 2011.
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by ClownLoach »

storewanderer wrote: March 7th, 2022, 10:15 pm
ClownLoach wrote: March 7th, 2022, 9:44 pm Ralphs probably got suckered in and spent an ungodly amount of money on their rent only for the store to hemorrhage cash from day one. It definitely closed due to underperformance right at the ten year mark. The store was always completely dead, almost uncomfortably so. It also had a strange interior - probably the last to go up with the brown, cream walls with the green script and giant Ralphs logos everywhere, but then it had a full warehouse ceiling that was very dark and a dark brown, very dull looking concrete floor. It was a twin to Lake Forest which is unremodeled to this day and possibly the gloomiest feeling Ralphs you'll ever enter. The store decor felt very.... brown. It opened as a 24 hour store and slashed to a early close within two months. The Wells Fargo next door closed only a few years after it opened as a new build super sized branch during the era where they were only opening inside supermarkets. There were rumors of closure just a few years after it opened.

It sat empty for a year or so then Orchard and Ulta split it. Orchard demolished a good portion of the Ralphs for a garden center and actually had left some roof in place to hold up the HVAC units - the ducts were reinsulated and routed back onto the sales floor. Obviously they didn't last long either and Lowes liquidated the chain less than a year after they opened. Whole Foods had to build it back up. PetSmart converted a bank branch there on a tiny corner and opened a store that only had four aisles in it. They must have been convinced they had stolen a super valuable site with those insane car counts and spent a fortune on this tiny store sparing no expense. It never had any customers and closed after less than two years.
OSH stole some other supermarket sites around that time that were high dollar and pretty good stores. One was a 1999 build Lucky in Pleasant Hill (built with Jewel interior, I forget if it opened as Albertsons or as Lucky).

That Ralphs was basically one built in a Kroger type of feel. Kroger builds of that period were, yes, rather brown due to the cement flooring and the way the interior went with it. The dark ceiling also was a strange choice, not sure what the deal with that was. All you would have had to do was install a white tile floor with some accents around perimeter/frozen around the store, made the ceiling white or cream, and it would have basically looked like any other less than 10 year old Ralphs looked at the time (clean and bright).

Petsmart has a store like you describe in Carmichael, CA as well. It has a few more than 4 aisles though. It is in front of a Wal Mart Neighborhood Market and Home Depot, I am not sure what the building was before, perhaps a video rental store. It seems to have steady traffic.
I found a single picture on Yelp, which further explains how dead this store was. The ceiling was painted a very dark beige and the lights were turned 90 degrees from the normal Ralphs - so they were perpendicular to the aisles. That is probably why it felt so dark even during daylight hours.
Last edited by ClownLoach on March 7th, 2022, 10:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by Retailuser »

Wow that dead store lasted that long. When I worked there we were lucky to have three customers an hour.
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by norcalriteaidclerk »

storewanderer wrote: March 7th, 2022, 10:15 pm
ClownLoach wrote: March 7th, 2022, 9:44 pm Ralphs probably got suckered in and spent an ungodly amount of money on their rent only for the store to hemorrhage cash from day one. It definitely closed due to underperformance right at the ten year mark. The store was always completely dead, almost uncomfortably so. It also had a strange interior - probably the last to go up with the brown, cream walls with the green script and giant Ralphs logos everywhere, but then it had a full warehouse ceiling that was very dark and a dark brown, very dull looking concrete floor. It was a twin to Lake Forest which is unremodeled to this day and possibly the gloomiest feeling Ralphs you'll ever enter. The store decor felt very.... brown. It opened as a 24 hour store and slashed to a early close within two months. The Wells Fargo next door closed only a few years after it opened as a new build super sized branch during the era where they were only opening inside supermarkets. There were rumors of closure just a few years after it opened.

It sat empty for a year or so then Orchard and Ulta split it. Orchard demolished a good portion of the Ralphs for a garden center and actually had left some roof in place to hold up the HVAC units - the ducts were reinsulated and routed back onto the sales floor. Obviously they didn't last long either and Lowes liquidated the chain less than a year after they opened. Whole Foods had to build it back up. PetSmart converted a bank branch there on a tiny corner and opened a store that only had four aisles in it. They must have been convinced they had stolen a super valuable site with those insane car counts and spent a fortune on this tiny store sparing no expense. It never had any customers and closed after less than two years.
OSH stole some other supermarket sites around that time that were high dollar and pretty good stores. One was a 1999 build Lucky in Pleasant Hill (built with Jewel interior, I forget if it opened as Albertsons or as Lucky).

That Ralphs was basically one built in a Kroger type of feel. Kroger builds of that period were, yes, rather brown due to the cement flooring and the way the interior went with it. The dark ceiling also was a strange choice, not sure what the deal with that was. All you would have had to do was install a white tile floor with some accents around perimeter/frozen around the store, made the ceiling white or cream, and it would have basically looked like any other less than 10 year old Ralphs looked at the time (clean and bright).

Petsmart has a store like you describe in Carmichael, CA as well. It has a few more than 4 aisles though. It is in front of a Wal Mart Neighborhood Market and Home Depot, I am not sure what the building was before, perhaps a video rental store. It seems to have steady traffic.
For the longest time,the Carmichael Petsmart was actually a bank(Security Pacific)then credit union branch.The canopy/awning over the teller drive-thru remains intact.
For your life,Thrifty and Payless have got it.
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by ClownLoach »

Retailuser wrote: March 7th, 2022, 10:33 pm Wow that dead store lasted that long. When I worked there we were lucky to have three customers an hour.
And now they're opening an Amazon Fresh across the street where Big Lots used to be!

I think it was a case of the little old store being sandwiched between two big newer stores. Too many stores in the area.

That Amazon will be dead on arrival.
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by Retailuser »

I hope that this is allowed here but I found this on this sties sister site.
https://www.groceteria.ca/board/viewtop ... =27&t=2846
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Re: Ralphs 69 goldenwest and warner

Post by submariner »

Retailuser wrote: March 8th, 2022, 8:51 am I hope that this is allowed here but I found this on this sties sister site.
https://www.groceteria.ca/board/viewtop ... =27&t=2846
Hey, That's me! :D

I'll allow it ;)
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