Sorry for the delay, everyone. I had other things to take care of at the end of last week that pulled me away from my blog work. Hopefully this store tour will be worthwhile... |
| Photos courtesy of Dan Asnis |
Welcome to Old Tappan! If you're wondering about this store, and think it looks absolutely nothing like any other A&P you've seen before... you're right. This location originally opened as a Finast, and was later taken over by a Foodtown operator. In the late 90s, it became A&P as we know it (presumably with the 90s Foodmarket decor), was remodeled to the Fresh 1.0 decor package in 2005, and sold off to Estevez Foodtown in 2015. The Foodtown has since closed as of last fall.
Old Tappan is located East of A&P's headquarters in Montvale, to the right of Lake Tappan, where the town gets its name from. Old Tappan is also on the NJ-NY border, and is just a mere twelve miles from both bustling Nyack, NY and Paramus, NJ.
Old Tappan is located East of A&P's headquarters in Montvale, to the right of Lake Tappan, where the town gets its name from. Old Tappan is also on the NJ-NY border, and is just a mere twelve miles from both bustling Nyack, NY and Paramus, NJ.
Today's photos are courtesy of Dan Asnis on Flickr. If you don't know who he is, he has one of the largest collections of retail photos in the Northeast, including this photoset of the Foodtown in Old Tappan, and the original drive-by photos of the store when it was an A&P, respectively.
Upon entering the store, our friend Dan found this lone A&P cart outside the entrance. Could this maybe be an augury of what will be inside the store?...
...yep. Good old Fresh 1.0- I guess you could say historic A&P photos- above the cases. It's funny, because I've referenced these so many times off the site to contributors and fellow bloggers, but never actually in an article. I have no clue what to actually call them using less words than the above matter.
I believe that the skylight-light-boxy things above the produce department here are left over from Finast, it just has a ridiculously 80s supermarket vibe. Notice that the Fresh 1.0 faux canvas boxes now have Foodtown's logo seamlessly incorporated into the design, which is very odd. I believe these are actually new knockoff ones that Foodtown put in. Ages ago I saw better close-ups of these Foodtown knockoffs but I can't seem to locate them now. I'll update the article if I ever come across them again.
Despite the canvas boxes that are used in Produce - the fresh departments - like the Delicatessen, Meat, and Seafood counters all use this odd script-ish font now, which Estevez had put in.
We can see more of the A&P historic photo case toppers (wow, that's a mouthful) here at the packaged meats section. Take note that Foodtown also took an idea from Rouses Markets (who acquired A&P's New Orleans division) to reuse the aisle markers but do slightly more than just stick a decal on them, like ACME Markets did. We'll be covering more of Rouses' acquisition later this year, so stay tuned.
Some signage is retained from the A&P days, such as the Fast Lane signs to the left of the photo here, as well as the Thank You For Shopping... and Customer Services signs as we will see below...
Overall, I feel like Estevez Foodtown did a very nice looking (albeit, 'bang-up' or dare I say 'quick fix' job) at their Old Tappan location, but unfortunately that wasn't enough to keep this location in business through 2019. Reviewers commonly cited high prices, dirtiness, and (believe it or not) worse than the final A&P days. The store was beaten by three ShopRites in the immediate area.
Thanks to Dan Asnis for today's photos!
A&P Fresh of Old Tappan
216 Old Tappan Rd.
Old Tappan, NJ
Finast > Vitale Foodtown > A&P Fresh > Estevez Foodtown
Old Tappan, NJ
Opened as A&P on June 26, 1998
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