A&P grocery chain said it was closing its city stores on this week in Philly history

In a city replete with food peddlers and grocery proprietors, a Canadian chain would find a footing in Philadelphia.

The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company Inc., better known as A&P, was where shoppers could get their chain-brand of Eight O’Clock Coffee beans freshly ground in-store and in their preferred style.

For a healthy stretch of the 20th century, a majority of U.S. residents shopped for groceries in an A&P store. The chain was founded in 1859 and by the 1940s, counted more than 16,000 locations spread between the Atlantic and Pacific.

But by the spring of 1982, the grocery chain empire only had 70 stores in the Philadelphia region, and it was struggling to cover expenses.

On March 1, 1982, the chain announced it would be pulling out of Philadelphia. A&P would close 29 stores in the region, including all 11 left in the city. More than 2,000 people would be out of work amid a historic recession and rising energy costs.

It was the conclusion of a reorganization plan that resulted in the closure of 350 stores across the country at the end of 1981 and beginning of 1982. It would leave the chain with a little more than 1,000 stores, including more than 100 in Canada.

The long and drawn-out end for the once-vast grocery empire had begun.

In May ’82, the chain announced that the stores would reopen as Super Fresh Food Centers, and laid-off A&P workers would get first crack at the upcoming job openings.

But the chain’s inability to evolve with changing market conditions would continue to hamper its progress, and eventually lead to its demise, according to Business Insider.

A&P and its nearly 300 stores would hang on until 2015, when it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for a second time, and sold off the rest of its catalog. The Super Fresh locations were absorbed by Acme, the South Philadelphia-based grocery group that, according to Philly Mag, had assumed the crown of Philly’s top food provider.