Talk:Red Owl (retail chain)

Comments

Hi wiki,

I'm creating this page to provide some historical information about Masons Red Owl, which is mentioned in the Gamble-Skogmo article as being the surviving Red Owl store in Green Bay. I don't have more information about it, so I am marking it as a stub. Please feel free to point me to other categories that might be appropriate.

Thanks for your help!

Mccambri (talk) 01:58, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Now that this article covers the whole Red Owl chain, it needs expansion. I plan to add material about the surviving store in Minnesota, and the history of the chain as a whole. I hope to add a photo or two as well. Jonathunder (talk) 16:54, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

I moved this article to "Red Owl" which had been a redirect to Madagascar Red Owl, but all the links to it were for this grocery store chain, not the African bird. I'll add a hatnote to disambiguate, should anyone arrive here by surprise. Jonathunder (talk) 17:12, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Founded well before 1969, I think

I disbelieve this article's assertion that Red Owl was not founded until 1969. I think someone inserted an assertion that one of the two Red Owl stores that survive today was founded in 1969, and then someone else construed it as meaning the once-large chain as a whole was founded at that time. Michael Hardy (talk) 20:41, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

I can confirm that there were Red Owl stores in Michigan in 1967, and from what little I've been able to glean online apparently the chain existed for at least a couple of decades prior to that. One reference mentions a 1965 Michigan court case that implied the chain was already well established at that time. The overall impression from scattered, anecdotal sources is that it was one of the largest grocery store chains in at least three states for at least three decades, and that in my opinion is what the article should primarily be about.

In its present form, the article almost reads like an advertisement for one of the two currently existing Red Owl stores, with only a brief mention of the other and about three sentences discussing the history of the chain. It would benefit the article greatly to find more sources to include more information about the historical Red Owl grocery chain. mwalimu59 (talk) 17:22, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

All right, I've gleaned together what I could from a few websearches and expanded the lead paragraph. Some of the information was from abstracts of articles requiring pay for access and really needs proper references. Plenty of room for improvement. Not yet addressed and probably worth mention is a 1965 Michigan court case, Hoffman vs. Red Owl Stores. mwalimu59 (talk) 18:42, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was Move Red Owl to Red Owl (retail chain), Move Red Owl (bird) to Red Owl. Mdann52 (talk) 15:46, 9 July 2012 (UTC) (non-admin)

• Red Owl → Red Owl (company)
• Red Owl (bird) → Red Owl

– To avoid muddling of timeless facets; see WP:Recentism. Relisted. Favonian (talk) 20:59, 27 June 2012 (UTC). Snowman (talk) 10:52, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment the bird was not really known, and had to be rediscovered in 1992, so the bird seems to be the one with recentism issues, since the store chain has been around since 1922. Perhaps you should use a different rationale? 70.49.127.65 (talk) 12:17, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: The species authority is (Grandidier, 1878), so it has been known to science for more than a hundred years. The species would have existed for 1000s of years prior to discovery. Snowman (talk) 12:24, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support but not per nom, nom's rationale is a hash. Rename because the bird has more educational value than the store. 70.49.127.65 (talk) 12:17, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
• Comment: It might be better to move the shops to "Red Owl (store)" as suggested by a user on the Bird talk page. Snowman (talk) 12:32, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
• Comment: If the Wikipedia standard is to give a species common name priority over a business name, I don't see a problem with applying that standard in this instance, as long as the article that gets the name includes a hatnote redirecting people looking for the other, and all of the existing links and redirects get corrected accordingly. I question whether (company) is the correct qualifier, given that "Red Owl" wasn't the company name per se, but that's a separate issue from the question of which article should get the unqualified name. mwalimu59 (talk) 15:04, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support with bird as Red Owl, store as Red Owl (store) per Snowman's suggestion above Jimfbleak - talk to me? 15:26, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Yes, I think "Red Owl (store)" is the best name for the shops. Snowman (talk) 19:45, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. The Madagascar Red Owl is a better title for the bird article. Jonathunder (talk) 16:58, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment. It used to be called "Madagascar Red Owl". It is now called "Red Owl" by the IOC, so I think "Red Owl" is the best name for the article about the bird. See IOC Wold bird list. Snowman (talk) 19:27, 19 June 2012 (UTC)
• Perhaps it's not, since there are no other "red owls", and if it were that wouldn't necessarily mean it'll be used. Not a very good rationale. —innotata 20:37, 23 June 2012 (UTC)

• Weak support. I believe most Red Owl stores (except for two apparently) were renamed after the Supervalu buyout. I think people looking up the store might be interested to know that there actually is an owl that is red, while I think those who are looking for the owl are less likely to be interested in an all-but-discontinued grocery store brand from the Midwest; so it makes more sense to have Red Owl land on the bird with a hatnote for the store. Gobōnobo ^{+ c} 04:06, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support Per Gobonobo, you could say. It's not obvious which is more notable, but the stores are largely historical now. —innotata 20:37, 23 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. "Recentism" is not a good rationale for claiming something is not the primary topic, especially considering the store chain has apparently been around for almost a hundred years (btw, I don't think the recentism essay says what you think it does). The store gets more page views than the bird (3190 compared to 2141 over the last 90 days) and so meets the first criterion at WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. The second criterion is "long-term significance" and, personally, I don't see why an obscure bird is more significant than an obscure store chain. I would support turning Red Owl into a dab page, but I don't believe the bird is a clear primary topic. Jenks24 (talk) 11:46, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • Reasonable enough, though I think what Snowman's getting at is that is that more generally, a (remarkable) species has more intrinsic importance. The store is just barely around these days—it's mostly a bit of (regional) history; people typing in "Red Owl" will get the store first. If that's OK, I don't see a problem with Red Owl being a dab. —innotata 13:44, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• People have criticised the Wiki for the vast number of topics on popular culture, and I think that the move that I have suggested would benefit the Wiki. Incidentally, when there are only two options there is no need for a dab, because signpost headers suffice. Dabs are made with a list of least three pages. Snowman (talk) 14:39, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• I'm afraid I don't see how a store chain is "popular culture". Your comment about there being no need for a dab is a common misconception. See WP:TWODABS. If there is no primary topic then it is perfectly acceptable to have a dab page listing only two articles at the 'primary' location. Jenks24 (talk) 14:12, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Stores

Should there be some standard of notability which stores are listed in the "Stores" section? I suspect that what's there now is little more than a list of stores that some Wikipedian who happened upon this article decided to include. At its peak, there were several hundred Red Owl stores; while it might be possible to come up with a full list I doubt if most of them are notable enough to deserve mention. It's not immediately clear what qualifies as sufficient notability, other than the one (or very few) that's still open. mwalimu59 (talk) 19:45, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

If the ones for which there is no citation were removed, the list would quite short. Jonathunder (talk) 22:14, 29 October 2018 (UTC)