North Hills Flashback: A Real Rewind

Last month, the lone remaining Blockbuster Video stores in Alaska closed for good. The chain is nearly nonexistent now, down to a single store, having lost to streaming services and automated kiosks. However, anyone of a certain age certainly remembers going to a video rental store, picking up a VHS tape or two, and bringing it home to enjoy a movie they couldn’t justify purchasing, missed in the theater, or simply wanted to watch for the sake of watching it.

Residents of the North Hills were not left out of this experience, part of being entertained in the 1980s and 1990s. In fact, they had multiple choices and the king kahuna of video stores even had a spinoff store at McIntyre Square.

The first Blockbuster location opened in the 1980s in a plaza now referred to as Ross Shops. Located at the north end of the plaza where Harbor Freight is today, the space was enormous and seemed to have nearly every movie title imaginable available for rent. They even had direct-to-VHS releases along with video games, new movies for purchase, and snacks. Everyone braved the sloped parking lot, later made infamous as the spot where Pittsburgh Steelers running backs Le’Veon Bell and LeGarette Blount were arrested, to pick up the hottest new VHS releases. (Rumor has it there were also a few folks who took the BetaMax version instead). Later, DVDs were also available for rent.

Blockbuster may have been the biggest player in the market, but a smaller rental store, Movies Plus, opened a few miles north on McKnight Road a few years later. However, it never could keep up with its competitors and soon faded into obscurity, being replaced by Laser Storm in 1996. Movies Plus also had a store in Wexford Plaza. Eventually, Blockbuster moved in there instead.

The other chief competitor, of course, was Giant Eagle. Capitalizing on the dialect of Pittsburghers, the video department was called Iggle Video and was nearly as massive as Blockbuster. At the McIntyre Square store, this used to be a completely separate department with its own exterior entrance. (Look for a bricked-over entrance on the PNC Bank side of the building; a careful eye can spot where the door once was). Today, the entire area has been completely revamped to the point where it is nearly impossible to tell where it was, but its in-store entrance was where the refrigerated meat counter ended (on the right side headed toward the checkouts). Giant Eagle proved a formidable force in this department, as many would pick up a movie or video game for the weekend as they were doing their grocery shopping.

This business was so popular that many Giant Eagles built in the 1990s actually were built with Iggle Video in mind. The Pine Creek store, opened in 1999, is a perfect example of this. The smaller entrance to the right of the main door was for Iggle Video. Rather than shoehorn the space into an existing store, as was done at larger, older stores, Iggle Video was an integral part of the Giant Eagle experience, given as much priority as a Citizens Bank branch or even a deli counter. By the end of the aughts, the side business had folded, with each store gradually killing off its Iggle Video as Netflix, Redbox, and online streaming from cable companies moved into the arena. The last store locally with an Iggle Video was the Gibsonia store, one of the last built with room for it. Today, all Giant Eagles have found new ways to repurpose the space, although remnants such as the outdoor entrances can still be found in some locations.

Blockbuster managed to peacefully coexist with Iggle Video and even tried their hand at further expansion, opening Blockbuster Music in McIntyre Square. Located where Chuck E. Cheese currently operates, it was basically another competitor for National Record Mart, Waves, Camelot, and the like. With many other stores selling CDs and tapes, including discount retailers and big box electronics stores, there was little room for another competitor. Besides, most people associated Blockbuster with movies, not music, leading to a bit of confusion with the store. (There were a handful of folks who actually went there to attempt to rent a movie). The store only lasted a few years before giving way to Chuck E. Cheese, which returned to the North Hills after a seven year hiatus in 2000. Music stores in general began to fail shortly after that time period thanks to iTunes and other online services.

Blockbuster tried another business in the North Hills in the early 2000s. When Pier 1 Imports relocated from the building on Ross Park Mall Drive to Ross Towne Center, Blockbuster opened a clearance center in the old building. Remember how Blockbuster always had dozens of copies of a new release, all of which seemed to magically vanish after a month or two as a new movie came out on video? Did you ever wonder what happened to all of those video tapes? Blockbuster’s clearance outlets were used for exactly that purpose. While it seemed like a good idea, especially for DVDs (which don’t degrade like VHS tapes), it failed rather quickly and faded into obscurity, much like the music store.

Once Netflix and streaming services began to nip away at Blockbuster, the company began to downsize in an effort to save itself. While it never did take the necessary steps to modernize and compete in a changing world, it did continue to have its loyal customers. The Wexford location closed first, followed by a downsizing of the Ross store. However, during the Great Recession, it finally succumbed to the fate of so many other video rental stores. The once mighty giant of North Hills video rentals had fallen, taking memories of “Blockbuster nights” on which everyone remembered to “be kind and rewind” with it. The only remaining way to rent a movie in the North Hills is to visit the library.

While the store may be gone, those simpler times of driving to the store and renting a video, not having to worry about a web connection, mail order, or automated box outside a grocery store, are fresh in the minds of many as the news of another Blockbuster’s closing spreads. The only thing that could enhance those nights, of course, was a pan pizza from a building with a distinctive red roof…but that’s a subject for next week.

Who remembers Blockbuster (and perhaps Iggle Video) fondly? Comment away!