Bealls Department Store - Indian Harbour Beach, FL

Bealls Department Store #7

204 E. Eau Gallie Boulevard, Indian Harbour Beach, FL - Indian Harbour Place

     Jammin' out to some Redlight King -- wait, I think I've started a paragraph like this before. Anywho... In the last My Florida Retail post, we took a look at the Publix store in Indian Harbour Place. Now, in this post, we'll be taking a look at the shopping center's other anchor, Bealls Department Store. I'm pretty sure Bealls was an original tenant to this plaza when it was built in 1983, although they have updated their building since then.

     Bealls Florida is a department store chain that operates over 70 department stores throughout Florida, along with operating over 400 Bealls Outlet and Burkes Outlet stores in the Southeast and Southwest US. Bealls Florida shares no relation to the Bealls store owned by Stage. Bealls Department stores carry the typical department store fare (clothing, shoes, home items), however what makes Bealls different from the others is that they carry merchandise unique to the "Florida lifestyle" - meaning a large focus on casual wear, athletic and golfing clothes, and beachy home items among other things. If you want to buy a heavy winter coat, Bealls is probably not a good option for finding that!

     Upon first entering the store, you find the Young Men's and Junior's clothing located between the two sets of entrances, with shoes directly in front of you. Most Bealls stores use the combined drop ceiling/open ceiling effect, which you can see in this photo. This store only had the open ceiling over the Young Men's/Junior's departments, although some Bealls stores also have open ceilings and even skylights over some other departments. This effect also makes for one classy Roses' Discount Store as well! As l_dawg2000 commented, "This is one nice looking store, inside and out!"

     Looking into the Young Men's/Junior's departments, which had that large cylindrical light fixture over it (which looks a lot like a floating lampshade to me).

     Moving away from the front of the store, this photo is looking toward the back of the store from a center aisle. This aisle passes along the edge of Women's clothing and shoes.

     Moving into the back of the store now. This is looking down the main back aisle into the home and housewares departments.

     Another photo of the main back aisle in the home and housewares departments. There is also a small seasonal section back here as well, which you can see in the background of this photo where the Christmas trees are.

     Moving away from the main aisle and into one of the smaller aisles within the home department. Here you can see the "HOME" department sign clearly.

     Looking toward the back wall in the home department here, where the dishes and dinnerware sets were located. You can also see some examples of Bealls' "Florida lifestyle" theme expressed on that shelf of hand towels in the foreground, as there's nothing like a pink flamingo with a Santa hat and and some palm trees to express the true meaning of Florida!

     Another example of "Florida lifestyle" merchandise from the home department, expressed in palm tree and seashell themed bath accessories. As styertowne commented, "I love the wicker tissue holder!! This is definitely where Rose from the Golden Girls shopped!" All that's missing are some flowery pastel towels to go with it!

     Children's and baby clothing take up the rightmost portion of the store, with Girl's clothing in the back right corner and baby clothing in the right center portion. A few of the clothing racks from the men's department are also poking out at the left side of this photo.

     Continuing further along the right side wall (going closer to the front of the store) is the Boy's clothing department. Just beyond that was a small toy section set up for the Christmas season, as well as a small corner for overflow from the Men's department.

     Looking across the front of the store, toward the open ceiling section of the building. This photo does the best job at showing the contrast between the two sections of the store. As styertowne commented, "I really like this ceiling effect. At least it's not the same-old, same-old homogenized stuff you could see anywhere. Kudos to Bealls for doing something different!"

     And finally, the checkout counter. This is the checkout counter located next to the left side entryway (with a similar set-up near the right side entryway).

    With this photo we will conclude our short tour of the Bealls Department Store in Indian Harbour Beach. This will also wrap up our coverage of the Indian Harbour Place shopping center, where previously we looked at the plaza's other anchor, Publix.

Happy that I beat my self-imposed challenge of copying these descriptions over before my Theory of a Deadman song finished playing, and now preparing to enjoy a OneRepublic song, until the next post,

Retail Retell (who, in order to embrace his honorary Floridian status, just placed an order for some of those pink flamingo hand towels and seashell soap dispensers as part of his Spring redecorating)

Lakeshore Mall - Sebring, FL

Welcome to Lakeshore Mall!

901 US 27 North, Sebring, FL

     The Lakeshore Mall opened on February 5, 1992 with four original anchors: Kmart, JCPenney, Bealls, and Belk, and also an 8 screen movie theater. The Lakeshore Mall was the first and so far only enclosed mall to be built in mostly rural Highlands County, Florida, in the county’s most populous city and county seat of Sebring, a town of 10,000 residents. This mall is rather large for a town of 10,000 (500,000 square feet), although this area is the main shopping district for the large rural expanse of south central Florida along the US 27 corridor. Back in the late 80’s and 90’s, many large suburban developments were built in Highlands County, with an expectation that the area was to surge in population. Many miles of roads were built in these subdivisions, however the people never came, and these large developments continue to sit mostly empty. Still in 1999, Sears was added as a fifth anchor to the mall. Until early 2018, the mall had all five of its original anchors open, the movie theater was still going strong and operating under the AMC brand, and the food court was completely filled. In all, the mall has 65 stores, restaurants, and services, but there were still some empty storefronts. Even with Kmart's closure in March 2018, Lakeshore Mall still has a decent draw and selection of stores within. During my visit in December 2015, there were a lot of people in the mall walking around. Most of the businesses in the main mall corridor are locally owned, with a few national tenants thrown in. The food court is comprised entirely of locally owned restaurants. This mall still acts as a main gathering place for the people of Sebring, and it has evolved to better serve the small size of the town. The mall is currently owned by BVB Properties, and it still retains its 90’s vibe, as we will eventually get to see. I wouldn’t call this mall dead or dying, but I think it may have been built a little too big for the current size of the town, as the developers of the mall were expecting the population of this area to have been much more than 10,000 by now. When I was here, I did see two new places opening up inside the mall, both of which were locally owned. At least it’s growth rather than decline! My main fear for this mall is if something happens to Sears Holdings, and the Sears store (which is still operating as of January 2019) also closes, like it's counterpart Kmart at the opposite end of the mall. That would mean two out of five anchors gone, and the anchor spots here will be really hard to fill, especially with the rural nature of the area. (However, I think Rural King would be a great fit for the empty Kmart space - the company is expanding in Florida, they love old Kmarts, and this area is quite rural - perfect!). However, if both the Kmart and Sears spaces are to sit empty for an extended period of time, the future of the mall will be pretty shaky unless the owners can think of something quick. I did a stand-alone post featuring the Lakeshore Mall's Kmart store, which was my primary reason for visiting the mall this day. This post will focus on the remaining 4 anchors of the mall (which we will start off this post with), concluding the post with a short walk around the mall corridor. If you like retail from the 90’s, then you’ll really like this place!

     First up on our Lakeshore Mall tour: Sears!

Sears #2135

901 US 27 North, Unit #130, Sebring, FL – Lakeshore Mall

     Sears opened their Lakeshore Mall location in 1999 as the fifth and newest anchor to the mall, joining the already established Kmart, JCPenney, Belk, and Bealls, all of which opened with the mall in 1992. This new full-line Sears was an upgrade for a Sears Hometown store located about a mile and a half to the north of here in Sebring Plaza. This store is still hanging on as of early 2019.

     The front of the Sears building can be seen here, or at least what I consider the front since this is the side that faces out toward US 27. The entrance you see here leads into the tool department, and the auto center was just out of frame to the right.

     Sears’ mall entrance can be seen here, which leads to the Women’s clothing department and the jewelry counter. 

     This is looking toward the children’s clothing department, located to the left of the jewelry counter. Merchandise pickup is also in the background. There were a decent number of people in here shopping too, as I’ve had a few occasions where I’ve gone into Sears at what would seem like a peak shopping time and felt like I was the only customer in the place. I’m not sure if this is typically the case here, or if it was just a before Christmas crowd.

     Looking down a center aisle that cuts though the Electronics and Appliance departments here, with mattresses in the background. As Devin Blackwood commented, "The floor here is holding up better than the store in my hometown that opened around the same time! That store is in a 30 year old building though so the foundation may have caused the floor to crack, and we don't have the nice ceramic tiles in softlines."

     The entrance into the auto center, located off of the tool department.

     The aisle that leads through the tool and seasonal departments. As Retail Retell commented when he first saw this photo, "Those types of red floor mats on the right are the memory I most closely associate with Sears from when I was younger, back when we used to go in the Wolfchase location (although theirs were green, I believe... though they may be red now that I think about it, haha)." Interestingly, those green mats are the same thing I associate with Sears from when I was little, back in a time when we went to Sears much more often than we do now. I think there may have been red and green mats used together back then, but I do remember green, which they don't seem to use anymore.

     I had a lot of places to visit this day, so those were all the photos I got inside the Sebring Sears store. Moving on from Sears, who do we have but JCPenney:

JCPenney #287

901 US 27 North, Unit #150, Sebring, FL – Lakeshore Mall

     JCPenney opened with the mall in 1992. This store was a relocation of an older JCPenney located in what is now the Winn-Dixie Plaza in Avon Park (the current Winn-Dixie is located in the old JCP building).

     Here we have an overview of the front of the JCPenney building. 

     JCP's mall entrance, complete with a nice look the original 90's tile used throughout the mall. Again, due to my time constraints, my photos of JCPenney and the remaining anchors are limited to some exterior views and photos of the mall entrances.

Bealls #16

901 US 27 North, Unit #110, Sebring, FL – Lakeshore Mall

     Bealls was one of the original anchors to the mall, opening with the mall in 1992. This Bealls relocated from a smaller and older location located in the Southgate Shopping Center a little bit further to the south. Bealls converted their old location to a Bealls Outlet after they relocated to the mall. You can see the original Bealls location by clicking here.

     Turns out this was the best photo I got of Bealls' exterior, which is located in the left part of the picture behind those pesky trees. This photo also gives a decent overview of the exterior of the back portion of the mall.

     Bealls' mall entrance, which is a complete time capsule back to 1992. Also, to avoid confusion, this store is a part of the Bealls Florida department store chain, which is completely unrelated to the Bealls chain owned by Stage Stores out west. 

     This entrance leads into the mall's food court, which is dubbed "The Oasis".

Belk

901 US 27 North, Unit #140, Sebring, FL – Lakeshore Mall

     Belk opened with the mall in 1992, and it was the only anchor to the mall that was new to the area upon the mall's opening.

     Pictured here is one of Belk’s two exterior entrances, this one being the one on the left side of the building. Interesting fun fact: the current owners of the mall, BVB Properties, are somehow related to founders of the Belk Department store chain.

     The Belk logo on the front of the building.

     Belk’s other exterior entrance is the one pictured above, located on the right side of the building.

     Belk’s mall entrance, which is probably the most modern looking part of the entire mall. Even though I was on a bit of a tight schedule, I should have taken a quick look around this place while I was here, as I’ve never actually been inside a Belk before (and as of early 2019, I still can't say I've been inside a Belk).

     This is the main exterior entrance into the mall can be seen here, which is located between JCPenney and Belk. Now is the time most of you have probably been waiting for – interior pictures of the mall itself! Get ready to take a trip back to 1992 as we step through those doors!

     After much anticipation, here we have our first look at the mall itself! This is looking up the mall corridor from in front of Kmart. A local car dealership opened a branch location in the mall in one of the storefronts, and placed some cars out in the main corridor. While I've local car dealerships put a few display vehicles inside of malls many times in the past, this was my first time seeing the dealership itself inside the mall. However, as Retail Retell and PlazaACME noted, there are some other malls that have/had car dealerships inside of them: Retail Retell: "A Fiat dealer was open in Wolfchase Galleria for a time. Not only did they have cars displayed in this vein, they were able to fit a few inside the store itself!" PlazaACME: "We have a Tesla dealer in the King of Prussia Mall. It's cool, they have displays showing how their cars work." Personally, I want to know how many people impulse buy a Tesla during a shopping trip to the mall!

     Cars aside, as you can see here, quite a few empty storefronts yet still some life.

     f.y.d - For Your Dollar&More. A former f.y.e. music store here, one of the few former storefronts I was able to recognize. It’s now some kind of locally owned dollar store.

     The interior of the former f.y.e. store is still full of f.y.e.’s 90’s décor (or the 90's decor from one of the many other brands f.y.e's parent company, Trans World, merged with over the years - you can read much more about that here if you're interested). Now instead of digging through bins of CDs (or cassette tapes if we go back far enough), you can dig through bins of pre-bagged clothing and other random stuff here. As Retail Retell commented, "That is one busy looking place... and I'm not talking about customers!" There might be a customer or two lost somewhere in between all of that stuff though! This store had a pretty strange selection of stuff in here, as luggage and framed art aren't necessarily things I would associate with a "dollar and more" store.

     Looking back toward Kmart from the mall’s untouched Payless ShoeSource store. Changing the logo now would just throw off the 90’s theme at this mall!

     Moving further down the mall corridor, closer to the center court. The Battlezone was some type of comic book/fantasy gaming store I believe, one of two stores like this in the mall. Just beyond this store and those next few further up the mall opens into its center court. As BatteryMill Retail and Daniel Westfall said (respectively): "Still looking retro with the tiles." and "I like the look of the classic tile floor in the mall. Meadowbrook in Clarksburg and Ohio Valley in St. Clairsville have both went to carpet. Something just doesn't seem right with those in my opinion."

     The cobbler is in. Now here's something that pretty rare to find these days: a shoe repair place. David's Shoe Repair is located in the storefront directly to the right of Payless Shoes, conveniently enough.

     For this photo we move a little bit further down the mall corridor, closer to the center court.

     Here's a quick look down the corridor that leads to the main mall entrance, which we saw a few photos up before beginning the interior photos of the mall corridor.

     With a giant skylight like that, you know we've arrived at center court! At the time of my visit, center court was set up for visits to see Santa.

      I guess this mall can't be too dead if they have one of these large trampoline things here. The ceilings in the mall are pretty low, even under the skylight, and from the picture it almost looks like someone could hit their head on the skylight if they jumped too hard!

     Looking into the mall's food court for this photo. The food court has 100% occupancy, however every food court tenant is a locally owned establishment. I believe Sbarro was the last national restaurant chain to remain in the food court here, until they closed sometime around 2013/2014-ish. A line was beginning to form at a little pizza place just out of frame to the left, as lunchtime was just beginning as I took these pictures. A full food court is quite the feat for this rural mall, as some major malls can't even claim such! (I don't know how the food court occupancy stands three years after I took these photos, but hopefully it's still a decent occupancy rate).

     Let's not start playing Lakeshore's funeral march just yet! In the back of the food court was this electric organ. I believe its sole purpose here was to act as advertisement for a local place that gives piano lessons, which was holding a contest for free piano lessons. If they had to drag this organ all the way here, they should have someone come out every once and a while and play it for the mall patrons. Nothing gives better atmosphere at a somewhat struggling mall like some peppy tunes on the organ while you shop, right? As Baltimore Will commented, "I remember in the last years of Hunt Valley Mall outside of Baltimore, a local piano store had a player piano set up in the food court. It used to facinate me when I was younger how a piano could play without a person."

     The Lakeshore Mall Cinema 8 has its main entrance located right off of the food court. While there isn't any signage on the building stating it, this theater is actually owned by AMC (who acquired this theater when they merged with Carmike). As andsome96 said, "Although this theater has never been under their ownership, that sign reminds me of what Regal used in a lot of their theaters built in the 90's." The sign they have here just seemed like a classic movie theater sign, and perfect for a 90's vintage mall. I discovered plans from shortly after my visit here that Carmike wanted to remodel this theater, although those remodel plans were stalled due to the merger with AMC. From Google images it looks like some sprucing up of the interior did eventually occur, however the sign you see in the photo is still there!

     I really don't know why someone was digging a hole in the planter (I assume it was some kind of repair), but they had dirt strewn all over the place. As Retail Retell put it, "Maybe they were looking for a time capsule before realizing the mall itself is one :P" That's the beauty of hiding something in plain sight, it always throws people off!

     Looking into a store near the Sears court. I'm not exactly sure what this place sold (I think it was another comic book/gaming place), however they did steal a cart from Kmart to put books they were trying to sell in! Dollar&More also had a stolen Kmart cart they were using for their merchandise, but I didn't get a picture of that one.

     And here we arrive at the other end of the mall, near Sears. This picture gives a nice overview of the very 90's planter/benches in the middle of the court, and the pattern in the tiles. 

     And so with this we will finish our tour of the Lakeshore Mall. I wish I spent more time that day looking at the mall in more detail, as I wasn't expecting this place to be as interesting as it turned out to be. If you're ever in the Sebring area for some reason, Lakeshore Mall is an interesting place to visit, especially if you need a good dose of the 90's!

So until the next post,

AFB

Roses Discount Store #553 - Palm Bay, FL

For a change, I will start off today's My Florida Retail post with a poem:

Roses are red,

Kmart's light is blue,

But as you can see,

Bealls came between the two!

     And with that, I will officially retire from poetry (even though it was a semi-creative way to explain the history of this building!). However, here's the more detailed history of this place:

Kmart #3734 / Bealls Department Store #42 / Roses #553

160 Malabar Road SW, Palm Bay, FL - Palm Bay West Shopping Center

     This building originally started its life as a Kmart, which opened in 1989 as part of the new Palm Bay West shopping center complex. Kmart closed this store in 2002 during their first wave of bankruptcy closures. In 2003, shortly after the Kmart closed for good, this space was subdivided into a Bealls Department Store (which moved from here, on the other side of town) and Ace Hardware. Bealls closed this store in 2013 after their rent went up due to Winn-Dixie's remodel. The Bealls portion of the building sat empty until 2015, when it was announced that Roses Discount Store would take over this space. Roses held their grand opening here on July 31, 2015. This store is currently the southernmost Roses location, although Roses has slowly continued to open more locations throughout Florida over the last few years.

     In my original post about this former Kmart store, we saw some pictures showing this portion of the former Kmart building vacant. Today we return to this building for a look at the new Roses store that decided to take up shop in the old Bealls space. It's actually pretty weird seeing a deep-discounter like Roses in a former department store building, so I think you guys will enjoy this tour. For those of you unfamiliar with the Roses chain, I like to describe their stores as a combination of  Big Lots, Dollar Tree, and Kmart all rolled up into one. Roses sells lots of mainstream products, but also has a large selection of closeout merchandise and items for $1 or less. If you like cheap stuff, Roses is the place to go! Back in the day, Roses was more like a mainstream discounter (like Walmart). However in the 1990's, after years of decline and store closures, Roses changed their product format into what they have now. That change not only managed to prevent the company from going under, but also made the company successful enough to begin expanding into new markets once again.

     Anyway, background info out of the way, here we have an overview of the entire former Kmart building. As you can see, Bealls heavily modified their portion of the old Kmart building when they moved in, however Roses did absolutely nothing as far as modifying the old Bealls. Roses' business model usually seeks out abandoned retail spaces for their new stores, and the buildings they take over usually receive minimal changes from their previous life (which was very much the case here).

     Here's an overview of just the Roses portion of the building.

     Other than Roses's signage, all of the detailing you see remains from Bealls. The old department store bones of this place make this Rose's feel like one of the fanciest discount stores out there! (A sentiment to which NCMike agreed, "Wow this is one of the nicest looking Roses I've ever seen!") Once we head inside, you might also come under the impression that this is one of the strangest looking Roses stores too!

     Another close-up of the front of the store. Roses' main entrance is located under the arch at the far left end of this photo.

     Looking across the front of the store from the right side of the archway. The Bealls was set up with two entrances, however Roses only uses the set of doors off to the far left side of the building.

     The unused entrance had its windows papered over. The set of doors on the left here are now used as an emergency exit, and the doors on the right are blocked by shelving on the inside.

     This unusually narrow door lies off to the side of the unused entryway. What could be behind this tiny door you ask? I believe it is access to the motor system and internal components that control the built in roll away hurricane shutters this building is equipped with. 

     Roses' main entrance on the left side of the building. Let's head inside...

     When you first walk into the store, you enter into the Women's clothing department. The clothing departments take up the left half of the store, with the hardlines over on the far right. Men's clothing is off to the right, and children's clothing is further back down this main aisle.

     Somebody fix that hole in the ceiling! One thing about this store is that the ceiling randomly switches between a drop ceiling and a warehouse ceiling as you move toward different areas of the store. This was an effect Bealls came out with in their early 2000's stores, and the ceiling transitions followed along with what departments you were in. Now at Roses, you just get weird sights like this giant hole in the ceiling above the clothing department. I haven't been in a Bealls from this era in a while to remember exactly why this hole was put here.

     The main aisle that runs through the clothing departments ends back here at the restrooms. The shoe department is to my left, and beyond the restrooms sign is the clearance alcove. Roses' furniture department is actually located in the back right corner of the store, although there was plenty of furniture randomly placed around the store like this.

     Pictured here is the main back aisle of the store that runs between the clothing and housewares & linens departments. Bins of sale items line the center of this aisle.

     A view from the back aisle into the clothing department, specifically men's clothing immediately in front of me.

     Looking from Men’s clothing toward accessories. The main entrance is off in the background.

     Another look across the clothing departments. If you look closely at the ceiling, you’ll notice some random light fixtures that don’t follow the typical pattern of the rest of the lights in the store. These were special lights installed to illuminate displays that Bealls originally had under these lights. As styertowne said, "This is most definitely the nicest Rose's I have ever seen. Of course, most of the ones I have been in are unrenovated former Ames." I'm sure most Roses stores pale in comparison to this one!

     Looking from the start of general merchandise back toward clothes near the front of the store. Here’s one of the better pictures I have of some of the random transition between the open and drop ceiling in here. As styertowne commented, "[The random ceiling transitions] mirror the random transition from potato chips to plastic floral grave wreaths!"

     Looking toward the front end near the tiny electronics department. The colorful bin of Popsicle contrasts nicely with the more neutral colors of the rest of the store. That will serve as my technical sounding excuse for how I didn’t like how this photo looked with the bin of Popsicle cropped out.

     Leading into Roses's backroom space (part of which was built out into some old sales floor space, which these doors lead into) were these red tiles. These tiles don't look like anything Bealls would have used, and they look too beat up to have been installed by Roses only last summer. Perhaps these are a Kmart relic of some kind? (PlazaACME felt quite sure these tiles were from Kmart). Either that or Roses has been pretty rough on these tiles for the few months they had been open in here when I took these photos.

     In the very back of this store is this huge skylight Bealls installed, which runs across the back of the store. I think in architecture, this design is actually called clerestory (your new word of the day). I believe under the skylight would have been home to Bealls' home and housewares department. As Retail Retell said, "Awesome shot! And I learned something to boot! :P" styertowne also described the effect quite nicely too, "It almost has an angelic effect...with the light pouring in from on high. The irony is that it is illuminating a Rose's, but hey--it's pretty nonetheless. BTW this also has to be the nicest Rose's I have ever seen...all thanks to the clerestory effect!"

     Another look at the large skylight, but from a different angle.

     Looking into the back of the store from an aisle in one of the hardlines departments.

     The back aisle of the store, which was essentially a giant wall of bedding sets.

     The main aisle that cuts through the center of the store is pictured here, looking toward the front. this is the aisle that separates the hardlines and softlines sides of the store. Also, near the front of the store this particular Roses had a sign advertising its new Mattress department. That stack of mattresses you see in this picture was the extent of the new Mattress department. As Retail Retell said, "That's it?! What a snoozefest. (ba dum tss)" Customers must have agreed as well, because I never saw the "mattress department" again after this visit!

     Another shot down the back aisle of the store, looking toward the clothing.

     The main center aisle, this time looking down it from the front of the store to the back.

     I think I was trying for a picture of the ceiling transition here. Anyway, in this picture you can also see part of the Health & Beauty and paper products aisles too.

     The main front aisle, looking toward clothing and the registers.

     Bealls' old right side entryway, which is now papered over and only in use as an emergency exit. We saw what this door looks like from the outside earlier in this post.

     Roses at Roses. Up in the front of the store was the fake flower department, which appropriately sold fake roses among others.

     One of Roses' food aisles, including the food department signage.

      While in the food department, I might as well share a few photos of some of the more interesting items I found here this day. First off, here are some chips and dip platters. I didn't take this photo for what the product is, but more for who makes them! I always thought the Arizona company only made iced teas and other drink related items, but it turns out they also have a side business making chips and salsa. This was the first I've seen of this. Iced tea and chips just seemed like a strange business combo to me (an opinion which Retail Retell seconded). In the time since I've taken this photo, I have bought some of these Arizona chips and dip platters to see if they were any good. The chips taste normal, and the salsa wasn't bad. For a dollar that one isn't a bad snack. I don't recommend the nacho cheese one though, as the cheese dip had a weird grainy texture and a cheap taste.

     Another product that jumped out at me in the food department was this bag of America's Choice sugar, complete with the older style packaging. As I said earlier, Roses also buys closeout merchandise along with regularly carried items. I took this photo only a few months after A&P closed all of their remaining stores.

     Somewhere among all of this stuff is the main aisle that leads you down the right side of the store.

     Another look down the main right side aisle.

     Probably not the best design configuration where the support columns are right in the middle of the main aisle. I guess when you inherit a building, you just have to deal with things like this sometimes.

     One aisle in the seasonal department was dedicated to nothing but these giant garbage cans, however a small stack of pink patio chairs found their way in as well.

     Looking up the main back aisle. The mirrors on the columns are another remnant from Bealls.

     Here is the aisle that runs along the right side wall of the store. The painted over wood paneling behind the shelves is some leftover remnants of Bealls' decor.

     This was an attempt at a closeup of some of the remnant Bealls decor that Roses painted over. 

     the main right side aisle again, looking toward the front of the store.

     A look down the main back aisle toward the left side of the store. This picture was taken from the relatively small furniture department.

     Jumping back up to the front of the store, here is Rose's relatively small electronics department. This department, located next to the front registers, features a decent selection of TVs, some other small electronics lining both outer sides, and a few racks of DVDs and CDs in the middle behind the gift card display.

     The wall of TVs in the back of the electronics department. The movie Finding Nemo was playing on the TVs at the time I was here.

     Here is one final look at the interior of Roses, as seen near the front end before heading back outside.

     And also one final look across the exterior of the former Kmart/Bealls now Roses, with the now-former Ace Hardware off in the background.

     It looks like the webmaster didn’t get the memo on this one... (You might have to click on the above screenshot to see what I'm about to explain.)

     This was just a little discovery I made on Friday, April 15, 2016 (around the time this photoset was originally posted to flickr, but still keep that date in mind). I don’t know why, but I ended up doing a store location search on Bealls’ website that day. Much to my surprise, it turned out the Palm Bay location (now the Roses we just took a look at) still pops up on Bealls’ store locator, even though Bealls closed this store 3 years ago! I was surprised Bealls hadn’t caught this yet after all that time. If someone thought this store was still here based off of the store locator alone, they sure would have been in for a surprise when they pull in the parking lot! Thankfully, this error has been corrected (which I would hope after the store had been closed for 6 years!)

     On the opposite end of the plaza from Roses is this Winn-Dixie. This store is one of Winn-Dixie's Transformational stores, which you can see in more detail in this AFB post.

     In front of the Palm Bay West Shopping Center, facing Malabar Road, is this McDonald's. This McDonald's is a corporate owned location that opened in 1993, and retained the red roof design until 2016 (when it remodeled shortly after I took these pictures). The reason I took these pictures of the McDonald's this day was because of the impending remodel, described on a giant "City Of Palm Bay Zoning Board Public Announcement" sign placed in front of this place. I actually wasn't able to read the sign other than the title (since the print was so tiny), but my assumption of what the sign was about did in fact come true. With that news in mind, I pulled back into the parking lot and circled the McDonalds three times trying to get a decent picture of it. However, due to the busy cramped parking lot and someone honking at me for (accidentally) blocking the drive thru lane as I tried to get a picture on my final lap, I had to settle for these side views of the building from the next door Amscot office.

     As l_dawg2000 said, "This one is really going to make for an interesting eyebrow, if they keep that rather large Play Place on the front of it!" Well, this place didn't get the "dreaded eyebrow" in the end, instead getting McDonald's new gray boxy look. The PlayPlace structure was retained, and really, the remodel didn't turn out too bad for a modern McDonald's.

With all that extra stuff out of the way, that's all I have for this post. Until the next time,

AFB