The “Father of the Bride” Grocery Store

Due to my parents’ recent move and my dad’s recent hospital stay, I have sadly not had time to do much stalking as of late.  While in Palm Springs this past weekend my mom happened to ask me if I had some locations stockpiled (or should I say “stalkpiled”? ) for times such as this.  Well, as I explained to her, I have so many darn locations on my “To Blog” list that half the time I forget about them, which was the case with the spot I am writing about today – the grocery store from the 1991 movie Father of the Bride.  I stalked the market way back in early May and had completely forgotten about it until yesterday morning when I was going through my Picasa web albums and spotted the pictures I took while there.  So, don’t worry mom!  The problem lies not in there being a lack of locations to write about, but in me being able to recall them all!  Anyway, a couple of months ago I asked fellow stalker Chas, of the ItsFilmedThere website, to track down several locations from fave movie Father of the Bride, one of which was the grocery store where George Banks (aka Steve Martin) refused to buy “superfluous” hot dog buns.  Fellow stalker Owen had actually tried to find this location last year and had somehow managed to get into contact with actor Britt Leach who played the role of the assistant grocery store manager in the scene.  Britt, who has to be one of the nicest guys in the world, not only wrote back to Owen immediately, but subsequently wrote to me as well and did his best in helping us to find the place.  He informed us that the store was located in the Burbank area, possibly near the IKEA on North San Fernando Boulevard.  So with that information in hand, Owen and I tried to track the place down, but, for whatever reason, came up completely empty-handed.

Enter Chas, who somehow managed to get in touch with a member of the Father of the Bride production team, one who not only remembered the exact address of the store, but who also informed him that it had sadly changed hands in recent years.  At the time of the filming, the market was owned by Vons, but the property was shuttered a couple of years back, whereupon it was purchased by Henry’s Farmers Markets and the interior was remodeled shortly thereafter.  Such a shame!  As you can see in these pictures of the former Vons location, though, the exterior, which was not featured in FOTB, still looks almost exactly the same today as it did before Henry’s took over.

The interior, however, is another story altogether.  While it is a beautiful grocery store, the interior is, sadly, completely and totally unrecognizable from its appearance in Father of the Bride.

In FOTB, George Banks heads to a local market in order to cool off after having had a bit of a meltdown over his daughter’s impending wedding.  While there, he has an even bigger meltdown over the fact that while hot dogs are sold in packages of eight, hot dog buns are sold in packages of twelve.  So, he decides to take a stand by ripping open packages to remove the four offending buns.  When a befuddled clerk tries to stop him, George says that the hot dog and hot dog bun corporations “are not ripping off this nitwit anymore, because I am not paying for one more thing I don’t need.  George Banks is saying ‘no’!”  LOL  He winds up getting arrested and is sent to jail, where his wife Nina (aka Diane Keaton) has to bail him out.

And even though the store now looks completely different, I just had to find the hot dog bun aisle while I was there so that I could pose with a package of buns.

You can watch the Father of the Bride grocery store scene by clicking above.

Big THANK YOU to Chas, from the ItsFilmedThere website, for finding this location!  You can check out Chas’ Father of the Bride filming locations page here.

Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Henry’s Farmers Market, aka the Father of the Bride grocery store, is located at 1011 North San Fernando Boulevard in Burbank.

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