TheGreenMeanie

Sorry to bring up an older subject, but does anyone know anything about this tower I found on Getty Images? Never heard anything about it before:

"(Original Caption) A giant gold abstract star tops the tower dominating an entrance to Houston's "Eight Wonder of the Modern World." It's the city's new Astrodome Stadium which will be inaugurated Friday night, April 9th, with an exhibition baseball game between the New York Yankees and the Houston Astros. The $31 million dome-covered stadium has a seating capacity ranging from 45,000 for baseball to 66,000 for conventions. The new home of the Houston Astros, formerly called the Colts, features a $2-million scoreboard providing a half acre of information for fans watching the game played under the translucent, hurricane-proof roof."

Disappointing for two reasons: absolutely loved Sweet Tomatoes and absolutely despise In-N-Out.

I recently discovered there was a Del Taco at 802 N Loop 336 W in Conroe. The location is now a Whataburger.

Ah, The Kettle! One of my favorite breakfast places due to their great breakfast buffet, which often was served late night as well.

I know officially the last location is the one in College Station, where I recently got to go to last year.

There was one in Conroe at 904 W. Davis but unfortunately it's been torn down and 7-Eleven has been built in it's place.

The Galveston location is still in business at 500 Harborside Dr. They've cleverly altered the building decor to go with the new name "America's Kitchen" (Kettle was known as America's Kitchen for quite a few years)

That's it, thanks! Pleasantly surprised they're still open. Kinda amusing to see that old Astros mural is still up in the batting cage area.

Sorry to bring up an old topic, but I've got a question that's been nagging me. Around 1994-1996 friends and family used to go to an amusement center in the area of Almeda Mall. All I remember is that it was a nondescript metal building with no company name located behind the Target/Marshall's shopping center nearby. It was an arcade with indoor batting cages. For the life of me I can't remember the name of the place (never knew it to begin with.) Does anyone remember this place?

According to the photographers comments from the first image in the group.

 

 

Dunno any history on it. Although I would warrant a guess that it was not used after the move to Minuted Maid Park, or as it was known at the time Enron Field.

Thanks for that. I'm not familar with The Magnolia Hotel, where exactly is that?

I don't know if it's really called that, as I found these photos on Flickr with that title whilst looking at Houston urbex photos. Anyone recognize this club? Know where it's at? Does it still exist? What's its story? I doubt that's the original carpet since the Astros only used that logo from 1995-1999, and behind the bar they have a mini-original Astrodome scoreboard.

   I suppose the original poster is long gone...  But I went to Houston Sterling.  Before the OP was born.

 

   I remember that 7-Eleven sold to Stop-N-Go...  Maybe even that they "traded" areas.

Was on a mini-haitus, actually. Glad to see this thread grew somewhat!

And when did you attend?

Thanks for that info, tiger. Apparently my searching didn't go as far as yours did. I also found out that I have a co-worker that actually worked there, so I'm going to pick their brain a bit about it.

Okay, now that the location has been verified, when did it change over?

I thought so, but wasn't 100% sure. When did it get changed over to IKEA? I can remember around 94-95-ish first becoming aware of IKEA entirely.

This may not be as old as some of the other buildings/businesses, but I'm still curious.

STØR Furnishings International Inc. was an American furniture chain based in City of Industry, CA, that opened in 1987. It sold European-style furniture and ready-to-assemble furnishings. IKEA filed a lawsuit against the company shortly after opening, claiming copyright infringement, and was settled in 1988 with STØR being forced to change the layout of their stores and advertising. STØR was acquired by IKEA in 1992.

The Houston STØR location was a franchised location. When the brand was purchased by IKEA, this store continued operating under the same franchise agreement, becoming one of only a few independently franchised IKEA locations in the world.

Does anyone have any memories or photos of it? Where was it located?

Hey guys, long time reader, first time poster here. Been a big fan of these forums for quite some time now, and thought maybe this would be a good source for a question I've had for a while -

Back when I was in high school (I went to Houston Sterling, by the way...not Baytown Sterling) we had to do a research paper on a corporation for one of our business classes. I decided to choose The Southland Corporation, owners of the 7-Eleven company, who changed their name in 1999. One thing that had always fascinated me was the fact that growing up, there were never any 7-Eleven's in the Houston area (I was born in 1984.) and I've always wondered why that is. I've been in contact with the 7-Eleven corporation for many years now in reference to this issue, but they despite getting yearly packets of information from them (brocures about stocks, internal publicatons, and other misc. paperwork) I've never heard an official reason as to why they've left. I am aware that the stores used to be in the city, as both being told by friends, family members, and other citizens of the city, and also by doing research on convience store buildings. Several former 7-Eleven locations can be located if you know what clues to look for. I've written a few articles about this, in fact.

These are the two strong reasons I've heard - one from the real estate side of business and one from stories and rumors from citizens of the city.

Real estate reasons I've heard was due to heavy competition with other gas stations in the area, most former 7-Eleven locations were sold off to Circle K (which then was sold to Diamond Shamrock, which was then sold off to Valero.) I can remember some Circle K's in my neighborhood, and I deffinately can remember those stores turning into Diamond Shamrocks.

The second story I've heard most offten is that the 7-Eleven corporation left the city due to a huge scandal involving employee fraud. Here's where it branches off - I've heard reasons vary from lottery fraud to rampant employee theft to a whole mess of other issues. I've searched newspaper articles and have NOT verified these as of yet, as I cannot find any mention of some kind of employee fraud going on, so I'm not too sure about this story, though I have heard several versions and variations of it from several citizens.

A few other things -

I have posted an online petition to get 7-Eleven to consider coming back to the city, which is located here: http://www.petitiononline.com/7112003/petition.html

That petiton has gotten an official response to me, from 7-Eleven Corporate headquarters:

"I found your petition on line regarding the lack of 7-Eleven’s in the Houston Area. I have forwarded it to corp. Real Estate. I’m sure it will work its way up the corp. ladder.

Regards,

(name omitted)

7-Eleven, Inc.

Division Construction Manager"

Also, Wikipedia states the following:

"7-Eleven is also absent in several cities in Texas (Houston, Galveston, Beaumont, Corpus Christi, San Antonio (1989–2012) - 7-Elevens in these cities after 1988 (1989 for its San Antonio locations) were sold to National Convenience Stores, which owns the Stop & Go franchise,^[36] later acquired by Diamond Shamrock in November 1995,^[37] now part of Valero since 2006), even though the United States headquarters is based there.^[38] As of 2012, 7-Eleven has no plans to re-enter Southeast Texas although Houston, TX-based Landmark Industries is dominant with their Timewise convenience stores which has over 200 locations, usually co-branded with a McDonald's and a major name-brand oil company."

Today I've come to you fellow forum members to see if we can finally figure out what the real reason for 7-Eleven's departure from the city of Houston is, and if we can put an exact date on when they disapeared. I'd also love to hear about your memories growing up with the stores in the city. Thanks for your time and attention!