Shop Talk: A "shoe-in" for Stanford mall? Shop Talk: A "shoe-in" for Stanford mall? (March 23, 2005)

by Daryl Savage

STANFORD MALL'S 'REINVIGORATION' MIX . . . The departure of many familiar shops in the Stanford Shopping Center (Signatore, PhotoTime, Boudin Bakery, Fresh Choice, to name a few) has made room for newer, trendier stores.

Mall officials are calling it a "reinvigorated tenant mix." Some shoppers have less flattering names. A group of women who routinely take early-morning walks at the shopping center, long before it opens for the day, say they miss the old standbys.

"It's beginning to look like every other mall in America, but more expensive than any other mall in America," one walker lamented. With the recent additions of the tony retailer Kate Spade, the tailored Anglo-Italian men's apparel store Kuhlman Company and the high-end Sony Style (which compares its customer-handling to a world-class concierge service), the mall has decidedly gone chic.

Walkers take special note: The trend to trendy will continue, especially with the two latest shoe stores soon moving in: the upscale Marmi, set to open April 28, and the international chain store Aldo, to open this summer. That brings the total number of specialty shoe shops in the mall to eight. Add in the shoe departments at Macy's, Bloomies, Neiman's and Nordstrom and there is no paucity of footwear for the entire Peninsula population.

Doing a s-l-o-w burn: The California Pizza Kitchen, which should have been open for business already in the former Boudin Bakery/PhotoTime corner, has not even started construction yet. They're blaming the famous Palo Alto permit process. The new opening date is late summer, at the earliest.
ALBERTSON'S CUPBOARDS ARE BARE . . . The Albertson's in Alma Plaza has just 24 hours to live. It officially closes it doors forever tomorrow, (Thursday, March 24), but it's virtually closed already.

"We're all pretty sad," one long-time employee said. "It's the end. Most of us will take jobs at other Albertson's, but it won't be the same."

The store has not been the same since the announced closure last month. Many shelves are completely empty. Shoppers dwindled to a handful, and there is only one checker.

"They (Albertson's trucks) come here and take our items to other stores --things like frozen foods, cereals, anything that's expensive," he said.

What's left is sparse inventory -- dog food, toilet paper and soft drinks.

"It looks like there's a war going on," remarked one shopper who lives around the corner from the store. Development plans call for the store to be rebuilt with a more modern look while waiting for another market to express interest, despite a tight size restriction under terms of the sale by Albertson's to developer, John McNellis, who formerly represented Albertson's in its dealings with the city.
NAIL SALON, NAIL SALON, POLISH DELI, NAIL SALON, HAIR SALON . . . Pronounce it PO-lish, not POH-lish, as in nails. The tiniest of restaurants has moved into a kind of "salon row" in the California Avenue shopping district. A Polish deli, aptly named "Polish Deli," has the distinction of supposedly being the only true Polish deli south of San Francisco and north of San Jose.

Tucked snugly in between a hair salon on one side and a nail salon on the other, with others down the street, this littlest deli at 456 Cambridge St. operates the old-fashioned way: It's a one-man operation for owner Martin Klosek, who opened in late February.

He sells 10 different kinds of Polish sausage in varying widths and lengths, and cooks the sausage to-order on a grill outside in the back of his shop. The diminutive Klosek, who owned a restaurant in Poland, escaped from his native country in 1987.

"We pretended we were going on a trip. We could only bring one suitcase or they'd stop us at the border. We were scared. We knew if they caught us, we'd go to jail," he said.

After a stint as an electrician in Mountain View, he was able to start the deli. "I love to cook. When I cook for my kids, they eat. When my wife cooks ...," he quipped. Klosek works seven days a week and gets his authentic Polish food from Chicago, which has the largest Polish population outside of Poland.

"I call up my sausage person in Chicago, they'll put my order on the plane. I drive to SFO in my truck the next day to pick it up. I wait to drive until about one or two in the morning because there is no traffic on 101 then. I have no choice. I have to pay the rent here," he said of his long hours. >

Heard a rumor about your favorite store or business moving out, or in, down the block or across town? Daryl Savage will check it out. She can be e-mailed at shoptalk@paweekly.com.

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