Reuters, Sunday, July 20, 1997 at 13:38
(By Andrew Hay)
SANTA FE, N.M., July 20 (Reuter) - On the corner of Santa Fe's popular downtown plaza, a scruffy Woolworth five-and-dime store looks out of place, surrounded by chic boutiques and art galleries.
Woolworth Corp's (NYSE:Z) decision last week to close its 400 five-and-dime stores nationwide after 118 years in business allows this northern New Mexico city to remove a relative eye-sore from its glitzy downtown area that could further boost its powerful tourism industry.
It looks misplaced now, but Woolworths was where people shopped for baking tins, penny candy, Christmas knick-knacks and other simple items for 62 years, or sat at the food counter for a modest bite to eat. Though no date has been set for the plaza store's shuttering, for many its eventual demise will sever the last link to an ethnic, quaint and more familiar Santa Fe.
"This is the last store that was here when I was a kid," said L.C. Becker, 65, savoring his daily coffee and roll at the general store's chrome and plastic lunch counter Saturday. "I think the plaza began dying years ago but with this place gone its dead."
Since Santa Fe was founded nearly 400 years ago, its plaza has been the heart of the city, a place where locals came daily to do business, shop and socialize. But many long-time residents have watched over the last three decades as plaza clothes shops, department stores and hardware stores have been replaced by up-market art galleries and tourist shops.
"With Woolworth's gone there is nothing left for us," Gloria Mendoza, a Santa Fe housewife and community activist, said. "It's no longer the plaza of the people, it's the plaza of the elite."
Woolworth once dominated the U.S. discount retailing market but its Main Street stores began to suffer as people moved out of the cities and into the suburbs. Instead of heading dowtown to shop at Woolworth, customers switched allegiance to larger stores such as Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) and Kmart Corp (NYSE:KM) on suburban highways and in strip malls.
Woolworth's faithful customers this weekend discussed the store's closure and spoke fondly of its popular $3 corn chip and red chile "frito pies". Most said they would miss the old store but some insisted the plaza would live on in its absence.
"Locals still flock here for fiestas and parades even if they don't come here every day," said Frank Romero, a former Santa Fe policeman who remembers the plaza as a wild and raucous place in the 1960s.
"This will always be our plaza, no matter what," said Romero, polishing off his two egg, two bacon breakfast at Woolworth's food counter.
At a party attended by artists and professionals in the hills above the city this week, one woman said it was sad to see the store go but quickly wondered what type of gallery or store would take its place. Then someone from out of town asked how a store like Woolworth had been allowed on the plaza in the first place.