Oakland County Retail: A Rainy Day at Kroger Jack: Kroger #448, Troy, Mich. (#5)

A car repair brought me to Troy's Motor Mall on a rainy Friday morning, and to pass the the time I decided to visit a store or two in the area while I waited. Undeterred by the torrential downpour, I set off on foot to the nearest Kroger store.

Kroger store #448, dubbed "Coolidge" by the company, is located at 1237 Coolidge Highway in Troy, in the Midtown Commons shopping center just south of Maple Road. Its neighbors at Midtown Commons include Kohl's, The Home Depot, and Michigan's only Target Greatland store. Originally Farmer Jack store #614, the building was constructed in 2001 under ownership of A&P. It resembles many other Farmer Jacks from the late 1990s and early 2000s, particularly Kroger #442 in Northville. Like all of the other Farmer Jack-turned-Krogers, which some of us Michigan retail enthusiasts call "Kroger Jacks," it was acquired by Kroger when A&P exited Michigan and shuttered Farmer Jack in 2007. It has the all-caps "block letter" Kroger logo that adorns many other Kroger Jacks.

Any trace of Farmer Jack is long gone from the interior, which was remodeled not long ago with Kroger's Urban Mix decor package.

I like Urban Mix. It's hard to choose my favorite of Kroger's new decor packages, between it and Artisan. One of my favorite bits of its styling is the pattern on the aisle markers.

I'm a sucker for tessellations.

The font used for the products listed on the aisle signs is a carryover from the chain's Bountiful decor, it seems.

The store has an "eagle's nest" staff mezzanine, much like other Farmer Jacks from this era. It's located above the pharmacy here.

I have to laugh at Kroger's absurd choices of local points of interest included in the word mosaic above the dairy department. They probably didn't have many ideas, as they decided to take up space with "City of Troy" and "Oakland County," and mentioned the nearby Troy Transit Center twice. Few of the featured names are locations I'd associate with the area, and there are a couple of names up here I've never heard before. I do appreciate, however, the almost easter-egg inclusion of Urban Mix's stylized ampersand.

The beer and wine department includes a couple of oddball standalone aisle number signs.

I'm not a fan of the decor Kroger uses in their beauty departments. I find it really bland and boring, not very distinctive - if you told me it was from Bed Bath & Beyond, I would have believed you. I might be wrong, but it seems like this has been exactly the same since Bountiful.

Back-to-school sales are already in full swing...

I've found that in many renovated Krogers, there's a small piece of a previous decor package left original. This store's throwback decor is a double-sided Script sign marking a price scanner and help phone. Script was likely this store's first decor package under Kroger.