Sea Isle City Acme — Open For Business!

Photos courtesy of Michael Lisicky

So here are the pictures of the Sea Isle City store that Michael had sent in a while back. While prepping the Beach Haven pictures he just sent in, I discovered that I had lost these pictures. He resent them today! This store reopened on March 22, the same day a Sea Isle City. And like Sea Isle City, Beach Haven looks pretty much the same as it did before the storm. Michael reports that $3 million dollars was spent repairing this store. None of that money used for new decor. The department names are now painted blue but that appears to have been done prior to the storm. You can jump over to pictures of the store being cleared out by clicking here. The letters were all brown for our first visit back in 2010.

If you scroll back up to the shot of the front of the store, you'll see that they added the red apples in the window above the entrance.


The very original Meat and Deli signs are STILL in place!  Produce and Frozen Food signage is from the Checkerboard Arch Decor era.




Unusual aisle markers. They look a bit homemade and are still too large for this low ceiling store.

For a look at the Sea Isle City Acme in it's early days... 
along with an article, please click here.

Beach Haven Acme — Open For Business!

Photos courtesy of Michael Lisicky

The Beach Haven Acme, heavily damaged from Sandy, reopened on March 22nd. Thanks to Michael for providing us a look at the repaired store. It doesn't look much different than before the storm. All the shelving and cases have been replaced but the Alberstons Marketplace Decor remains. Pictures of the store completely cleared out appeared on the blog at the end of last year. You can jump to those pictures by clicking here. (Scroll down below the Sea Isle City pictures)

Here's what Michael had to say about the store...

"The store reopened at the end of March, after 5 months of rebuilding following Hurricane Sandy. However customer traffic remains slow, even in the middle of summer. The store enjoyed a strong 4th of July week but sales have once again slowed down. This is typical throughout hard-hit Long Beach Island. The front section of the Acme received the most damage and had to be "rebuilt", even though it looks almost as it did last year. Every piece of flooring and shelving has been replaced. Reports say that there was between two to four feet of water in the front section of the store. It was initially assumed that this rebuilding process was going to be a temporary fix since the company had been proceeding with plans for a replacement store to be located next door. Those plans seem to be tabled for now. Hopefully business at the Acme and LBI will continue to grow as the shore continues to rebuild. Right now it's mostly wait and see."


New, colorful banners hanging along the front-end. Very similar to the ones Albertsons had hanging in stores back in the early 2000's. You can take a look at those in the abandoned West Chester store by clicking  here.




The checkouts have been replaced. Brand-new numbered lights in place too! You can see these in the new Bryn Mawr store as well.


Whew... the original doors remain in place!



To the person who sent in pictures of Sea Isle City... I discovered this week that I apparently deleted the email and had not filed the pictures that you sent in. Could you please resend them? I will post them the minute they arrive!

Revised Summer Schedule...

Apologies for no new posts lately. The summer has been keeping me too busy with other things. I don't have a date yet for when new posts will be going up again. I'm shooting for the first week of August. The blog will be back up and running full-time in September.

Classic Acme by night!

Classic photo provided by Greg P.

Greg picked up this photo at a flea market. I haven't been able to identify it's location. Here's what he had to say about it...

"The photo is dated February, 1960, and was entered into a photo contest sponsored by the Diamond Camera Club of Wilmington, DE. The location is not identified, but the seller thought it might be Price's Corner. Evidently Acme took the corner space in this shopping center to maximize floor space and minimize the storefront. The photo is dated February, 1960, and was entered into a photo contest sponsored by the Diamond Camera Club of Wilmington, DE."

BREAKING NEWS CONTINUED>>>

ACME BEGINS NEW ERA OF LOW PRICES!

EVERYONE SAVES STARTING TODAY...
NO CARD NEEDED!

As I mentioned in yesterday's breaking news post, I had been prepping a post for today showing the new shelf tags at Acme. I began seeing them a couple of weeks ago and have been snapping pictures of them to share. Hadn't noticed any ties-in with the circulars or website so I wasn't sure what was going on. Yesterday I received a press release directly from Acme headquarters which explained all the details. You can read the press release by visiting yesterday's post down below. 

The big news is... no more SuperCard to get the sale prices! I hate those cards with a passion. Thanks to the CardStar app on the iPhone, theres's no need to carry them all around anymore. Still, it's annoying having to open the app and find the card every time I'm in a checkout line. Personally I think these cards are outta control. I was shocked recently to see even a store like Toys R Us has them. Nice to see Acme doing something different from most of it's competitors. 

In recent months, we've all been on the edge of our seats waiting to see what changes would be coming to Acme since it was acquired by Cerberus Capital Management. Details have been hard to find online since the new owners are a private company. I have been doing as much research as I could on Albertsons LLC, which is technically the company now running Acme. Albertsons LLC has been the owner of the stores not acquired by SuperValu back in 2006. They were rebranded Albertsons Market. Those stores have been card-free for quite sometime now. This past week Albertsons and Albertsons Market websites merged ditching the SuperValu designed site. You can read more about that at ProgressiveGrocer.com.

Now back to the new shelf tags...

First up is the "Low Price Every Day" tag. These tags all all over the store. It's almost crazy. Acme went from having minimal price messages, thanks to SuperValu who could never seem to get a clue, to now having hundreds up and down every single aisle! Seriously... you cannot miss them. 

Next up are the "Something more for less" shelf tag...

I'm assuming this is the new "sale" shelf tag. I was noticing a serious lack of sale tags that mention the SuperCard. There were some around but not many. It didn't occur to me that the card was getting phased out. It appears now that all weekly specials will get the new SMFL shelf tag. 

A couple of "Sale" tags still going here. There is NO shortage of red and yellow shelf tags anywhere in the store. 

Another big push is low prices on Milk. This is a huge sign above the milk case. (I should have pulled back for some perspective). These signs hang in multiple places back in Dairy in the two stores I visited.. I noticed too that the plastic milk bottles are still branded "ACME" but cardboard milk containers are "Essential Everyday". I looked pretty quickly so I could be wrong. I did notice tons of "ACME" branded boxes in produce displays. Hopefully they're bringing the name back after SuperValu banished it from stores.

Here's a preview of the new circular announcing all the big changes at Acme...

Click on images for larger view.

For now Acme is still starting its sale week on Friday. Other banners like Jewel and Albertsons begin the sale week on Wednesday. 

To view the full circular, please click here. 

BREAKING NEWS>>>

ACME LOWERS PRICES! 

BEGINNING TOMORROW,
SUPERCARD NO LONGER NEEDED

FOR SAVINGS!

NEW FRESHNESS GUARANTEE! 

REDESIGNED CIRCULAR!

CLEANER STORES!

The official press release sent to the Acme Style Blog:

ACME-What’s New?

Malvern, Pennsylvania, June 20, 2013- On Friday, June 21st, ACME Markets will unveil new changes focused on making shopping easier and better for their customers. 

The first change customers will see the card-free savings. All customers will get the same great prices, with or without an ACME SuperCard.

Additionally, customers will see lowered prices on the items they buy most. Throughout the 112 ACME stores, there will be thousands of items with lower everyday prices and many more on sale. 

ACME is also committing to offering the best selection of fresh quality product. If a customer is not happy, ACME will refund the purchase price and replace it with another item of equal or lesser value for free. This fresh guarantee, which ties nicely with the new card-free savings, will highlight to customers that they are in for a new experience at ACME. Customers will see a redesigned circular and new in-store signage designed to create excitement and illustrate the company’s commitment to quality products and great customer service. 

 “All customers deserve the same price on all items.” said Jim Perkins, ACME president. “We feel it is our job to give everyone a great shopping experience. With our cleaner stores, superior customer service, and offering our great values to everyone, we can do that.”

_____________________________________________

As fate would have it, tomorrow's post is all about the new store signage! I've been taking pictures of it all as I've visited stores in the past two weeks. I was wondering why they weren't advertising these new low price messages in the circular or online but I now see that everything officially starts tomorrow!

Former Acme – Randallstown, MD

Photos courtesy of Michael H.

Location: 8053 Liberty Road, Randallstown/Baltimore, MD

Opening date and closing date of this store are both unknown. The satellite images reveal it was built sometime before 1964. The store is currently an ALKO Clothing Outlet which specializes in discounted designer clothing and health care professionals' uniforms. They have three locations throughout Baltimore.


Some interesting things to see here... check out the cool drum lights hanging along the awning. No telling if they are original to the Acme or added later. We haven't seen anything like them on the blog.  The lower awning has been completely removed and the entrance and exit doors have been moved to the center of the store.


This side of the store has the drop ceiling along the left side which is where the Dairy aisle would have been. The original entrance and exit would have been off the left side of the photo.






A 50's styled rear attached to a 60's styled pitched-roof store. Funny thing is... we saw a similar situation in the last "Pick of the Day" post at the former Cortland NY store.


The beam for hoisting the compressors to the second floor and the doors to bring them inside remain intact.


Second floor break room and bathroom windows which no one is escaping from.


A great looking former pitched-roof store!

Satellite Images...

A great view of the rear of the store. The Acme may have extended a bit on the left side where that flat roof section meets the pitch.

Historica Aerials... 

2005

1971

1966

1964

1957

Thanks to Michael for taking these pictures for us to enjoy!