

Others say they will miss employees who made it a priority to feel cared for and valued by customers. “Maybe you’ll have to take a bus to get to Kroger or Walmart, or pay someone to pick you up,” she said. Sutton says he and the other residents of the Parthenon Towers don’t yet know how or where they will shop once the grocery store closes. Still, Sutton says she travels to Piggly Wiggly about three times a day, partly to run errands for her neighbors, who have an even harder time commuting. The Parthenon tenant, Gwendoline Sutton, has a difficult time walking and relies on a motorized wheelchair to get around. The sudden closure is especially difficult for those who live in the nearby Parthenon Towers, a public housing building for the elderly and disabled. Residents of the Parthenon Towers, a nearby public housing building, say the closure of Piggly Wiggly will make it harder for them to get groceries. They also have to fix their sink or whatever happens,” Gatiss said.ĭisadvantages for residents with mobility issues Julia Richie wpln news “People living in apartments and houses, they just don’t need chicken and pasta.

The manager, Lee Gatiss, says it was intentional to ensure that shoppers could find a wide variety of items, from sewing kits to hardware tools. Part of the reason why it’s difficult for customers to say goodbye to Piggly Wiggly is because the store was more than a grocer.

So it came as a shock to the members of the community when they came to know about the plan to convert the building into apartment and retail space. The corner market wasn’t always Piggly Wiggly, but it has housed some kind of grocery store for nearly 70 years. Started in Memphis in 1916, the supermarket is known for creating the first self-service checkout lines and price tags for each item in the store. Piggly Wiggly has a long history in Tennessee. Stores in South Carolina and Mississippi have also recently closed, raising concerns about potential food deserts.
PIGGLY WIGGLY HOPE ARKANSAS SERIES
The fate of Piggly Wiggly on the West End is the latest in a series of closures that have curtailed the series’ presence over the years. He says he made it a point to make customers feel valued. Manager Lee Gatiss says this job has been different from other retail gigs he’s had before.

Nearly a year spent travelling around the world with my girlfriend, now wife (we got engaged in Paris on the trip).“It wouldn’t be the same without this wonderful, old, crazy place,” says longtime employee Thrack Michaels. The travel story you'll never stop bragging about: The Tourist Club, a German beer hall/chalet you hike to on Mt. The place you don't want anyone to know about but are willing to divulge here: When I lived in Bangkok I thought it was cool that I regularly hopped on motorcycle taxis to take us down our street. On one of my US cross-country trips, my brother and I took a cardboard cut-out of President Bill Clinton (I was a White House intern during his administration and a big fan) and we took pictures with it as we went: Bill Clinton and us at the Grand Canyon the three of us in his home town of Hope, Arkansas at the Piggly Wiggly supermarket, etc. Most unusual item you have travelled with: Peter Jennings was once behind me getting on a plane and he was talking to someone so it sounded like the nightly news, but just for me, and just about the place he was going to. I love having my morning coffee in them.īest celebrity encounter while travelling: They serve steaming gluwien in them, but you can keep them if you forgo your mug deposit. I really like these mugs I got in the Christmas markets of Austria. "You have two small milks", I slowly explained to the puzzled pension owner, "But we only need one milk. My Spanish isn't great and late one night in San Sebastian, Spain, I was negotiating a room for my wife and me and mixed up the words for "milk" and "bed". In Mongolia I drank a fair amount of airig, fermented mare's milk offered when you visit a stranger's yurt. We weren't seriously hurt, but without our car we had to get rid of half our belongings and keep travelling by rail. My wife and I bought a car in London to travel around Europe but it was totalled in an accident in Poland. Your most stranded, "oh-my-" travel moment: Irreverent responses from our favourite travel ninjas.įamous person (dead or alive, real or fictional) you'd most like to go on a trip with:Įveryone asks what's #1 on your list of places you want to go before you die.
