No One Out-Buffets The Hut

Pizza Hut

179 E. Cocoa Beach Causeway, Cocoa Beach, FL

     Once an icon of the American roadside, it's becoming a sad reality that the famed red-roof Pizza Hut is becoming harder and harder to find. While sitting down for a family pizza night under one of the famous stained glass lamps was a Friday night tradition for many, unfortunately, the pizza business has changed. With delivery and carry-out options taking over the vast majority of pizza sales across the United States in recent years, dine-in pizza began a slow decline. While finding a freestanding, red-roofed hut isn't super uncommon yet, these are getting much rarer by the day. As the years have worn on, there's become such an increase in discarded huts out there, that's it's become a thing to pick out UTBAPHs (Used to be a Pizza Huts) in towns across the nation, seeing how these iconic buildings have been repurposed in countless ways. While Pizza Hut and its franchisees have been slowly adapting to changes in the pizza industry and converting/relocating many older locations into carry-out only ones, a red hut-shaped roof will sometimes peek out in the distance behind a bank and a gas station, taking us back to a day when it was fun to go out for a pizza - much like we can still do here in Cocoa Beach. 

     Pizza Hut and its red roof found its way to Cocoa Beach in 1986, building on a small piece of land at the end of the Route 520 Causeway, just two blocks from the beach. Pizza Hut's placement makes it a very convenient place to stop for lunch or dinner after a long beach day, and that's probably a contributing factor to the longstanding success of this location. Being at the end of the main causeway into Cocoa Beach, the stretch of beach just steps from this building is one of the busiest in town, and Pizza Hut is the first thing you see pulling out of the parking lot. Between the visitors and the locals, this place has been able to keep itself going for 35 years now. The building itself has seen some minor upgrades since it first opened, but it still has the classic Pizza Hut feel to it.

     While the red-roof hut buildings are getting harder to find, what got me up here to visit this particular location was to experience another dying Pizza Hut feature: the lunch buffet. While fairly common back in the day, the Pizza Hut lunch buffets have begun to slip into obscurity. From what I understand, the lunch buffet isn't even an official Pizza Hut concept anymore, but franchisees that still have buffet equipment in their older locations can still offer one if they wish. Since the buffets are semi-unofficial these days, Pizza Hut's website doesn't mention if a location still offers one, so you have to do a little digging to figure out where the operational Pizza Hut buffets are. Interestingly, I never knew the Cocoa Beach Pizza Hut had a buffet until a year or so ago. I was originally planning to drive to St. Cloud to their Pizza Hut buffet for this post, until I found pictures on Google showing there was still one in Cocoa Beach (as of January 2020, anyway, when I made this visit - the last Pizza Hut buffet in Brevard County). That discovery cut my drive in half mileage-wise, which I was happy about! When I made my Pizza Hut buffet visit in January 2020, the remaining buffets in Central Florida (that I knew of) were this one, St. Cloud, New Smyrna Beach, S. OBT in Orlando (across from the Florida Mall), and Haines City (although there may have been a few more floating around in the greater Orlando area, but those listed were the ones I found online in my buffet search). However, with all the pandemic stuff going on, I have no idea what the fate of any of the Pizza Hut buffets locally have been since, not even here in Cocoa Beach, so I can't say with certainty if any of them are still open at all. Buffets in Florida are open again at full capacity, so there's a chance some may have been revived, but I don't know (and the fact Pizza Hut wasn't officially on-board with the concept any more doesn't help the fate of these any). At least I got to visit this one in January 2020, back before the world fell apart, and the fate of the buffets went up in the air.

     Anyway, my babbling aside, I'm sure we're all feeling a little hungry right about now, so let's head inside and eat:

Photo courtesy of Google Maps

      Stepping inside, I wouldn't call the dining room the best example of modern decor, but it has seen upgrades from the days of Pizza Hut's trapezoid windows, wood paneling, and stained glass lamps (as fun as all those things were). Still though, this place has that cozy, warm feeling a Pizza Hut dining room has always had.

Photo courtesy of Google Maps

     Anyway, stepping through the front doors, the dining area expands out to your left, with the buffet bars straight ahead. To the right is a short hallway to the bathrooms, with the kitchen just beyond that. The photo above looks from the dining room back toward the entry area, where the hostess stands to bring you to a table.

Photo courtesy of Google Maps

     Here we have a better view of the front of the dining room, looking toward the buffet. The photo above, as well as the two before it, I took from Google Maps, as I didn't get any spectacular overview shots of the dining room myself. Even if I did manage to pull off a shot like this, my phone camera would have taken in all the glare from the sun shining through the windows and done something funky with the lighting, so the photo wouldn't have turned out as crisp as the one above. While we've had these nice overview shots to start off our look at the interior, we now return to my funky photos for the remainder of this post:

     Speaking of my phone doing strange things with the lighting, here's a perfect example of that! Looking toward the main entrance, my phone washed out a lot of this picture from the glare, leading to a rather dark looking scene near the buffet. Immediately to my left from this vantage point was the kitchen, as well as the counter with the cash register.

     Before we get to the food, we'll take a quick walk around the dining room. Pictured here is the back of the dining room, looking away from the buffet. Rows of booths line the front and back of the dining room, as well as the partition in the middle.

     Behind the partition was a space with some larger tables, reserved for bigger groups.

     While I was here, a large group of construction workers from a nearby project came in on their lunch break, filling up one of the big tables back here, which was certainly a nice little rush for the place. Besides the construction workers, there were a few other people dining in as well, the entire dine in crowd arriving for the buffet. Without the buffet, I really don't know how much of a dine-in business this place would have in the early afternoon hours, although the pictures on Google seem to suggest the dine-in business does pick up going into the dinnertime/evening hours, probably when the beaches begin to clear out for the night. I believe the time between the noon lunch rush and the evening dinner hours are some of the slowest during the day for restaurants, with Pizza Hut coming up with the buffet concept to not only take advantage of the lunch rush, but also boost business during the slower afternoon hours. A lunch buffet certainly seems more attractive to an individual on lunch break than having to order a whole pizza (and in turn, having to do something with the leftovers).

     Now that we've had our taste of the dining room, it's time we get to taste the food itself! The lunch buffet consisted to these two food bars near the restaurant's front entrance - one bar for the hot food, and the other for the cold salad bar.

     While it looks rather small and is only offered for two hours a day, the staff here was doing a really good job of keeping the buffet full and replenishing food that ran out. In scouring Google reviews of other Pizza Hut buffets online, I know one if the biggest complaints is that Pizza Hut has a terrible time of keeping the buffet well-stocked. I'm pleased to say that wasn't the case the entire time I was here, and I was quite impressed at how well run the buffet at this location was.

     The hot food bar consisted of six different pizzas, baked noodles, and garlic bread sticks from what I remember. Of the six pizzas, one was a dessert pizza, one was plain cheese, and the other four had various toppings that would continuously change out as the pizzas were replaced.

     Turning our attention to the salad bar, well, it's a pretty standard salad bar. Some salad mix, additional toppings, and dressing made up the spread here, with a really good pre-mixed Cesar salad in the bowl at the top left corner of the image.

     Now that we've piled our plates high, let's head over to our table. I was seated at a booth not too far from the front door, I believe the booth behind the one pictured here. I actually took this photo to showcase some of the local flare decor on the walls, which there was no shortage of in this place! The wall space between the windows was covered in various pictures and knickknacks relating to the beach, Florida, local sports teams and colleges, and surfing (which Cocoa Beach is famous for).

     Settled in at our table, here's one last look at the buffet before we dig in:

     I visited this place with the intent to share my experiences with you guys, so of course I had to sample a little bit of everything (yes, that was how I justified all that pizza!). A food photographer I am not, but the way I put everything on the plate makes it seem like I was trying to do something fancy, which I wasn't going for - that was just a coincidence!

     If you couldn't tell by now, pizza and pasta is a huge weakness of mine, so I have no problems going out and sampling some for the sake of the blog! Like I said before, for what looked like such a small buffet, the variety and quality was very good, and I liked how the pizza toppings kept changing out to keep the variety interesting. For my second plate I went a bit more adventurous with my topping choices, getting a slice of Hawaiian pizza and one with sausage and banana peppers on it. I know a lot of people think putting pineapple on pizza is weird, but I like it.

     While I really enjoyed my lunch, I can't forget about dessert! On the buffet was a dessert pizza, which was half apple topping, half strawberry. The slice I took was from the apple side, and is essentially of the same style as the dessert pizza Cici's usually puts out on their buffet (if you're familiar with that). Speaking of Cici's (and while we're on the topic of pizza buffets), 2020 wasn't very kind to them either. It was just announced earlier this week that they declared bankruptcy, however, their bankruptcy plan was initiated as part of a pre-packaged, expedited bankruptcy deal with a new owner already in mind. While it sounds bad, Cici's will continue to operate as part of their turnaround plan, with no mass closures or anything like that as a result of the bankruptcy (although 77 of Cici's nearly 400 locations prior to the pandemic did succumb to the pressures of 2020). While pizza buffets were facing issues prior to 2020, the pandemic restrictions really didn't help that business model much.

     I enjoyed my Pizza Hut buffet experience, and I was happy to discover there was one still operating relatively close to where I live. However, as I mentioned before, with all the madness of 2020, I don't know if the Cocoa Beach Pizza Hut ever reopened the buffet, and recent reviews don't shed any light on an answer to that question either. Next time I'm up in Cocoa Beach I should swing by here to find out, but at least I was able to slip in this one visit before the world spiraled into madness.

     Before we leave, here's one last look at the Pizza Hut building, this photo looking at the back of the restaurant. While it didn't appear to be open at the time of my visit (as it looks like someone was using it as a parking spot), this place did have a drive thru window. Even if this window wasn't used much prior, maybe having this window came in handy the last few months as restaurants began to push drive-thru and carryout options even more.

     After eating all that pizza, a nice long walk along the beach sounds like a good way to finish off this post. I included the map above to show everyone just how close Pizza Hut is to the beach, the red pin marking the location of the restaurant.

     A nice lunch followed by a pleasant day for a walk on the beach, a win-win if you ask me!

     This picture looking out into the Atlantic will finish out our post on the Cocoa Beach Pizza Hut. While the fate of the buffet itself may be a bit uncertain these days, the restaurant overall seems to do good business due to its location, which is nice to see. So even if 2020 did happen to out-buffet the hut, the hut still stands here in Cocoa Beach to serve out pizza regardless, and hopefully that will continue to for many years more.

     So that's all I have for today's post (and I apologize for any pizza craving you may be having right now). Until next time,

AFB

Former McDonalds - Lake Wales, FL

In addition to the ailing Eagle Ridge Mall, Lake Wales is home to another retail oddity: a rare closed McDonalds!

McDonalds doesn't close often, and many times the properties are quickly scooped up by other operators when they do, so one sitting vacant is uncommon.

This McDonalds is located in a kind of awkward outparcel, and is also, as seen here, on a weirdly steep little hill. Look at all those awful gouges in the street- I'm really not sure why this little spot wasn't just lowered.

This location had been vacant for about 5-6 years when I came by to photograph it in 2020. It last shows as open in a 2013 streetview, and as totally shuttered in 2015. McDonald's bought the land for their replacement restaurant, up the road at 1978 FL-60, in 2014, so this location likely closed not long after.

For reference, that location was built on the site of a local car wash. This location was built in 1989, and likely last remodeled around 2002.

Like most closed locations, an effort was made to "de-brand" this location, covering up the bright red mansard roof with this gray and drab one you see here. This is common with closed locations, and is done because McDonalds considers the mansard roof as part of their brand.

A tiny bit of red can be seen here, but I think it's some kind of framing, not the old roof, as it doesn't match at all, it's just slats.

Gotta love that classic McDonalds brick. Hell of a crack in it, though, I hope there's no foundation issues at play.

I gotta wonder why the disabled parking spot seems to be one of the farthest away.

A better view of the back. I considered climbing the ladder, but I had places to be and no idea what shape the roof was in.

Weeds are starting to spring up in the cracks of the drive-thru lane.

And that's all I have for today, I hope you enjoyed! Lake Wales is an interesting place for retail, and I'd like to make my way out there again sometime soon.

Until next time, this has been Cape Kennedy Retail.

 

Target "Flexes" Its Muscles in Orlando

 

Target #3354

11619 Daryl Carter Parkway, Orlando, FL - Vineland Pointe

     While 2020 was a rather depressing year for retail, a year plagued with bankruptcies and store closings, there were still some bright spots to be had along the way. While we've talked about the recent Floridian supermarket growth spurt here on My Florida Retail and over on AFB, even on the national level, there were some interesting (and positive!) retail developments to be had. While we all know the sad story of Kmart, the storied retailer that is slowly (and I do mean slowly) departing into oblivion, one of Kmart's competitors has been taking full advantage of the chain's demise. Target has been gobbling up shuttered Kmart stores all over the country to convert into new stores, in places like Somers Point, NJ, Kill Devil Hills, NC, and Bradenton, FL, and even former Kmart stores in more far-out places like Jackson, WY and Lihue, HI. There are even more examples if you scroll through Target's list of upcoming stores, with roughly 10 or so former Kmarts (and even a few former Sears stores) in the works to be converted into a Target in some way. Target is certainly taking advantage of the current retail environment to fuel their own growth, with those former Kmart stores opening alongside numerous flex-format Target stores, Target's shrunken-down store format that's been the focus of the company's growth for the last few years. While the purchase of those old Kmart stores renews Target's commitment to full-line stores, the flex stores are a large (and extremely important) part of Target's growth plan. Target's flex stores can range in size from less than 20,000 square feet to somewhere in the 65,000 to 70,000 square foot range, propelling Target's growth in urban areas where large spaces are difficult to find (and in smaller towns where a fill-size Target would have never been feasible in the past).

     Target's flex-format stores (originally called 'City Target') debuted in 2012, and the format has been tweaked through the years as Target began to get a feel of running smaller-than-normal stores. Florida (and the Southeastern US as a whole) got its first flex-format Target in 2017, with the opening of the Target store near the University of Florida campus in Gainesville. Florida has gained a few other Target flex stores since, including locations in Tallahassee, South Beach, Coral Gables, and the store we'll be seeing today in Orlando, with future Target flex stores planned for Grove Station (near Miami), Bradenton (the old Kmart I mentioned before - Target opted small with that one), and Disney World. As I mentioned before, Target's flex stores vary greatly in size, with the store we'll be touring today being on the larger end of the spectrum for one of these stores. The new Orlando Vineland Pointe Target is 65,000 square feet, with a much more complete product selection than one of the 15,000 square foot college-campus focused locations.

     The Vineland Pointe Target is the largest anchor in the new Vineland Pointe shopping center, a new shopping center being built behind the Orlando Vineland Premium Outlets (a huge tourist destination located at the eastern edge of Disney property, just across I-4 from the last Gooding's). Being close to the tourist district and some new housing developments, Target's new store looks like it will be a popular destination for shoppers. Once tourism surges back into the area, I'm sure business will greatly increase here (and I've heard this store still gets pretty busy as it is, even with many tourists not coming into the area, so it looks like Target chose well with this location). The Vineland Pointe Target opened for business on August 16, 2020, the first new Target store in the Orlando area in over a decade. While smaller than normal, this store still sports Target's latest decor and most of the usual amenities, with certain departments cut back more than others to make up for the decrease in size.

     From the outside, the exterior design of this store is quite similar to what a new-build full-size Target would look like. Even at 65,000 square feet, this store was designed with dual entrances on either side of the building, a trait usually reserved for Target's largest stores. The photo above looks toward what I'd consider the "main" entrance, located toward the left side of the building. The other entrance leads you to the grocery department and liquor store, acting more like a side door for people wanting to get in and out with a few groceries (or bottles of booze). I visited this store not long after it opened, so the "Now Open" banner was still hanging from the facade upon my visit, seen above.

     The middle of the facade is a wall of windows, which illuminates the front end and the Starbucks kiosk inside. This store incorporates more windows into its design than the typical Target store, which is a nice touch we'll see more of as we tour the inside...

     Stepping inside, we see the wall of windows and vestibule behind Bullseye's playground, lighting up the inside (which is a nice effect in person while shopping, but for photos, not so much with all the glare!)

     Another Target logo can be found on the inner part of the vestibule, a white bullseye set onto a red-colored panel of glass.

     Like every store within close proximity to Orlando's tourist district, the Vineland Pointe Target has a large Disney souvenir department. While Target does have a deal with Disney to operate special Disney Store departments, that's not what we see here. This is just the usual tourist district Disney department, flanked with more souvenir T-shirts and tchotchkes than official Disney store stuff (which, if you look at the photo at that link, has a much fancier setup with a larger focus on toys). The Disney department at this store bumps against the main front aisle behind the check lanes, taking up a decent amount of floorspace in the clothing department.

     While the official Disney Stores within Target are focused on toys, T-shirts are the focus here in the tourist district. Commemorative T-shirts are a Disney vacation staple, and there was no shortage of shirts like this here.

     Leaving the magic of the Disney department behind us, the magic of Target can be seen before us looking down the center aisle. The aisle in the picture above serves as the dividing line between the hardline and softline sides of the store. We'll start our walk through the store by wandering around the hardlines side, which stretches out to my left from this vantage point...

     As we begin to venture further into the store, here's a quick look back at the front end and Bullseye's playground. We'll see more of this area later in the tour, so let's get back on track:

     Looking away from the front entrance, the main front aisle passes by the beauty department to my left, and office supplies to my right. The pharmacy counter can be seen straight ahead at the end of the main aisle, located on the left side wall.

     As one of Target's core departments, this store's beauty department wasn't shrunken much in this smaller store. The beauty department still received the fancy lighting and fixtures a modern, full-size Target would get, and looks really nice overall.

     From the front wall in the beauty department, here's a look toward the vestibule.

     More aisles of health and beauty products span into the store's front left corner, which is also home to the restrooms.

     A full-size pharmacy counter was included here too. Pharmacies are rather common in these Target flex stores, with pharmacies being included in some of the really small stores too.

     Health and beauty continues along the building's left side wall, eventually transitioning into seasonal merchandise and hardware as we move further back.

     Returning to the main aisle, here's a look toward the back of the store.

     Housewares occupy the center part of the hardlines side of the store. Housewares was one of the departments that was noticeably shrunken down in this store compared to a normal Target store, but there was still a comprehensive selection of the most popular housewares items for sale here.

     Some more round lights were placed in the center of the store for a classy effect. In addition to the wavy light strip that follows the length of the aisle, it really makes for a nice visual.

     While we've looked width-wise across the housewares department already, here's a look down one of the houseware aisles looking toward the front of the store.

     The fitting rooms are located in an island between women's clothing and the Disney department, as seen from this viewpoint from within the housewares department.

     Here's another look toward the clothing department before we turn the corner and return to the back of the store.

     Here's the dividing aisle between hardlines and softlines once again, but as seen from the back of the store this time.

     The back left corner of the store contains a wide variety of shrunken down departments, including seasonal, small appliances, luggage, toys, and sporting goods.

     This photo looks across the back of the store, showing off the building's entire length. It's not the largest Target by any means, but still quite the sizeable store.

     Continuing along the store's back wall, we enter the toy department, with electronics being the department to follow in the distance.

     Menswear resides across the main aisle from electronics, with electronics being the next department we'll explore:

     Electronics was another department that seemed fairly complete at this Target flex store, not being too much smaller than the electronics department at a standard P17 Target. This store also included a full-service electronics counter, a feature that's typically eliminated in the really small stores, which typically condense the entire electronics department into an aisle or two.

     Interestingly, the back wall of the store also includes windows. With stockrooms and receiving bays in the way, it's not common to see windows in the back of a store. However, this store was designed with the stockrooms and receiving bays to be on the side of the building, so the back of the store (which bumps up against I-4) was free and clear to have windows. Having windows in both the front and back of the store was really nice, and did a great job keeping the store bright.

     Leaving electronics, the next department we find is cleaning supplies, followed by the beginning of the grocery department. Baby supplies are located opposite these departments, bumping against the other clothing departments.

     Entering the grocery department, we find aisles of snacks and drinks in the store's back left corner. Grocery is another one of the departments that Target kept in its full form here, getting the full P-Fresh grocery selection of a normal sized store into this 65,000 square foot space - plus a liquor store too. This tiny Target has a larger grocery department than my local 90,000 square foot Target store does, which is quite strange to think about!

     Turning the corner, here's a look down the store's right side wall. The three or four grocery aisles in the back corner give way for the remainder of the grocery department, which we'll head toward next.

      Here's the main aisle that runs alongside the grocery department. The visuals here aren't all that different from what you'd see in a normal Target store, with the standard P17 signage in use here (as some really small stores lack the hanging aisle signs over the grocery department).

     As we walk past grocery, here's a quick peek into the baby department.

     The main center aisle through the clothing department, as seen from grocery.

     Nearing the front of the store, we find a few aisles of frozen foods before we transition into the "fresh" part of the P-Fresh grocery department.

     The side wall again, this time as seen from the front of the store.

     Here we have the very classy looking fresh aisle, home to produce, dairy, some pre-packaged baked goods, and some meat. With dry groceries being a popular item in the tourist district, Target went all out by offering the full P-Fresh assortment here, which is a very tourist-friendly selection of grocery items (snacks, frozen meals, foods easy to prepare in a hotel room). However, the most important grocery department in the tourist district lies to the right of all this, behind the windows:

     And that very important department is the full liquor store (as I've heard from my sources in the tourist district that parents need two bottles of rum to counteract every one day spent at Disney World). Even if that's not the exact reason, like I've said before, alcohol sells really well in this part of town, so Target felt it was worthwhile to add a liquor store to this flex location. While I've seen some remodeled Target stores get fancy wine and beer alcoves within the store itself, this is one of very few full-blown Target liquor stores in Florida (the only other Target liquor store I know of being located in the tourist district as well, in the Super Target at US 192 and SR 429 in western Kissimmee). I want to say I've seen other Target liquor stores in pictures from elsewhere around the country, but for whatever reason, Target doesn't seem to bother with them much in Florida (except in really high volume liquor sale locations, like we have here). However, in true Target style, this is one of the fanciest and nicest liquor stores I've ever seen! To be in compliance with Florida law, the entrance to the liquor store is located within the vestibule of the side entrance, although the all glass walls of the liquor store make it appear like it's part of the main sales floor, which I thought was a neat design touch.

     Turning away from the liquor store, we find the service desk tucked alongside the entryway.

     Completing our loop of the store, we find ourselves at the front end once again.

     This store has six regular check lanes, in addition to a bank of 8 self checkouts next to the main entrance (if I remember right). The really small flex stores tend to sacrifice the regular check lanes for a bank of 15-25 self checkouts (depending on the store's size and volume, as the much smaller self-checkout machines take up less space than the normal lanes).

     In front of the check lanes we find the Starbucks kiosk, which is set up like an island here rather than being tucked into a corner like you'd find at a regular Target store.

     Here's another view of the Starbucks counter, this time without the check lanes blocking the way.

     Lastly, I thought we'd finish out this tour with one of my favorite sights from this entire store - the giant Bullseye mascot statue! Bullseye keeps watch from his over-sized perch next to the vestibule, a much larger alternative to the usual Bullseye statue you'd find elsewhere.

     Back outside, we have a look at the side entrance, where the signage for the liquor store can be found. Of course, as I was leaving, a liquor delivery truck had to pull up out front and obstruct some of my exterior photos!

     And there you have it everyone - the new Vineland Pointe Target! Overall this was a nice little store, and it will certainly be popular with tourists and locals alike. While the selection isn't as extensive as what you'd find at any of the other Target stores in the area, this store still serves its purpose and provides all the basics. On the opposite side of Disney World, a similar (although likely smaller, based on the diagrams I've seen) Target flex store will be rising from the ground as part of Disney's new Flamingo Crossings development, a development which includes a number of new hotels in addition to a new shopping center that Target will anchor. While this may be Central Florida's first Target flex store, it's certainly not going to be the last. Unlike Walmart, who seems to have heavily curtailed new store development recently, Target continues to grow, using these flexibly sized stores and growing opportunities to expand their footprint to places the company would have never gone before. Target's recent expansion kick seems to be working out, and hopefully we'll see this momentum continue well into the future.

     Anyway, I felt this new Target store was a nice way to start off the new year. 2020 was a rough one, that's for sure, but let's hope 2021 brings us some better news, both in general and for the retail world as well!

So that's all I have for now. Have a Happy New Year everyone, and until the next post,

AFB