Richway Department Stores

Infobox_Company
company_name = Richway Department Stores
company_
company_type = Department store
foundation = 1968
location = Atlanta, Georgia
industry = Retail
products = Clothing, footwear, bedding, furniture, jewelry, beauty products, electronics and housewares.
homepage = None

Richway was the discount department store division of Atlanta-based Rich's. It was originally part of Rich's, and was later bought by Federated Department Stores when they purchased the Rich's chain. It was originally known as Richway, a Rich's Company with a more bluish logo than the later orange and black theme under Federated ownership. The sunrise logo means "Everything Under The Sun", the slogan used in advertisements from that period. The official name of the chain was later Richway Department Stores. A long tagline on commercials was "We don't look like a discount store, but our price tags give us away."

History

Beginning

Richway first opened in 1968 in metro Atlanta with suburban locations in Smyrna, Sandy Springs, Tucker and College Park. A location in Forest Park opened quickly after. The first two locations listed here still operate today as Target stores, with the Smyrna location renovated in 2005 for the second time. These original locations were known for their distinctive raised-wedge skylights that are still found today, yet were boarded-up, covered-up and hidden by a drop ceiling in the conversion. Richway stores were unusually large for their time, and ahead of their time with larger selections of merchandise than most discounters offered, but with a similar more upscale line like Target.

1970s and 1980s

Throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s, the chain spread across the Southeast U.S., with known locations in Georgia, North Carolina (Charlotte/Gastonia), South Carolina (three locations in Columbia), Florida (where it was added as a discount division of Burdine's), and two locations in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The three locations in Columbia were part of three malls (two now dead malls) that opened on the same day in 1977 known as Decker Mall, Woodhill Mall, and Bush River Mall. Richway also anchored the now-redeveloped Roswell Mall in Roswell north of Atlanta, which opened in 1974, another store with the retro skylights (now removed).

Gold Circle and Target

In 1986, Federated Department Stores merged Richway with their discount division, Gold Circle, but retained the Richway name in some markets. Federated by then was in financial trouble and as a means to boost the company's profits, sold all Richway and Gold Circle stores to Kimco which in turn sold 31 of those stores to Dayton-Hudson Corporation (now Target Corporation) in 1988. Target closed all of its new purchases and stripped them of everything, including the store fixtures. They all later reopened in early 1989 as Target and all continued to operate as such until Target began to replace the older stores in the mid-1990s. The movie "Career Opportunities" was filmed in 1991 at a Richway converted into a Target store in Atlanta. (Location T378).

Today

Today, most of the former Richway stores either sit abandoned or have been converted to other uses.

In Georgia, three locations in Jonesboro, Riverdale, and Roswell became Value City locations, with all but Jonesboro (and a non-Richway/Target in Doraville) closed again since early 2008. The Richway in Forest Park is now the Scott Antique Market. The Richway in north Marietta is today an office for Wellstar (which owns nearby Kennestone Hospital), since the Target moved a few miles northeast on Sandy Plains Road, not long after the Town Center at Cobb store opened in 1995. The Richway in College Park was converted to a Target in 1989, and closed in 1995 after store #0778 in nearby Fayetteville opened. Today a new redevelopment is planned for the store. The store northeast of Austell has been vacant for years since a new Target opened just slightly further southwest on Austell Road at the East-West Connector, after that road opened in the late 1990s. The Smyrna Target store still retains the old Richway skylight triangles on the roof, with the left (north) part still bearing the CompUSA sign since its closure in mid-2007. The Sandy Springs store also still has the skylight units, with the left (east) half of the building housing a Goodwill Industries thrift store.

Other Richways are in some cases in a sad state and sitting vacant where the surrounding area was in decline and no reinvestment was made in the former buildings. The Richways in Chattanooga (one at the intersection of Lee Highway and East Brainerd Road, the other at Northgate Mall) were Targets and have been closed, with the Lee Highway location ending up as a flea market (now closed). Several of the former stores located in the Charlotte area are still in use. Two stores on Charlotte's north side (at North Park Mall and Freedom Mall) have since been consolidated into a larger store in the University City area; the two former locations have sat abandoned for more than a decade. The former Independence Boulevard location is now used as a BJ's Wholesale Club; another on Tyvola Road has been torn down in the past 8 years. The Gastonia location to this day is still being used as a Target.

In addition to the above mentioned, two former Richway locations in Palm Beach County, Florida were also purchased and turned into Target locations in the latter part of 1989. The South Military Trail location has since been closed and sits abandoned; relocated to a more desirable part of town, and the Palm Beach Lakes Boulevard location still stands to this day. The location in Plantation, Florida was converted over to a Target store and had the façade updated in 2005 to reflect Target's changes in marketing approach, and to also expand the parking lot to include a parking garage.