Serving Subs With a Side of History

 

Welcome to Olean, NY- at one point in time home to four different Subway restaurants. Although now down to three, this particular Subway location has the most interesting story behind it as it has undergone a number of events that have effected its business. Originally located elsewhere, (see picture below) this location opted to relocate down the road and open in a former Pizza Hut.

Below is a picture of the former Pizza Hut (when it was abandoned)

Picture Courtesy of Auction Management Corporation.

For some unknown reason, the now relocated Subway opted to use a new at the time 'Subway Cafe' concept. From what I can tell, it would appear that the 'Subway Cafe' concept was a limited prototype and something that only a handful of locations did.What was a Subway Cafe? Read on to find out....

The Pizza Hut frame sign being reused. As you'll see below, a more permanent sign was installed later.

What is so special about Subway Cafe? Well, it offered a lot more beverage options:

....and a bit more options to choose from in terms of baked goods:

The other noticeable thing is that there was more seating than at the usual normal Subway and it had a 'real' fireplace.

Eventually the cafe branding was dropped entirely therefore making this a normal Subway.

So that covers that, but wait there's more history to cover. In 2018, this Subway experienced a fire and a result the building was torn down. But that didn't deter the owners as they decided to rebuild. So in an interesting turn of events, this location found itself featuring a new concept that a lot of other locations did not yet have. To wrap this post up, I leave you with pictures of the new modern concept.

Former Kmart #3172

 NOTE: This post comes from outside the blog's coverage area.

Going north on I-81 from last month's Kmart tour, we find ourselves in the Hagerstown, MD area to highlight the Kmart there. A few things to mention about this store is that it had a unique placement for its fitting rooms- and this unique placement suggests to me that this store did NOT have a KCafe. It also had one of the narrowest perimeter actionways I've ever come across thanks in part to the cleaning supplies aisles having been rotated 90 degrees at some point. 

Some vintage touches remained up until the end such as the front windows (usually bricked over) and the garden shop sign.