well i live in jacksonville, fl. we had a wide selection of stores...

something speshul (exactly how it was spelled) was where i saw the devastator gift set and my dad's mom telling me "look with your eyes and not with your hands"

zayres, jewelcor, service merchandise, montgomery wards, sears, woolworths

man i wish those stores were still around (and those prices!!!!!)

the last transformer i remember getting (before i started collecting) was powermaster prime from my mom's dad for christmas. i actually have a picture of me unwrapping it!

those were the days!

 

The common 'eighties spots for me were Sears, Best, Hills, and Childrens' Palace.

There was also some place in the mall, don't remember the name. Might've been a Mom 'n' Pop toy store or a chain - basically similar to Kay-Bee, but was gone before KB came to the local mall. (and now it's gone too)

 

We had a Wilbro here in Dothan! we didn't get a TRU (and a mall, either) until 1986, so Wilbro was THE place for TFs.
Beat the living Snot out of walmart and Kmart.
Where Wilbro used to stand, is a Big Lots. i walked in there and walked to within 5 feet of where the TFs were- i saw stacks of Metroplexes and Dinobots... i wanted to cry.
good times there.


I never got TFs from Revco, but i hated my folks for a couple years because right after the Atari meltdown, Revco had 3 feet deep bins of discounted cartridges ($2.50 was like the highest price for one) and i couldn't rub 2 bucks together.

We had a Monkey Ward and Sears, but they were desolate as far as TFs went.

 

Rite-Aid, it's where I got my Pretender Landmine.

 

I would say the top 2 stores that I bought G1 at, that don't exist now would be:

Service Merchandise and Circus World.

A good 80% of my G1 TFs came from Service Merchandise: Omega Supreme, Soudwave, Crosshairs, Sixshot and many more. Service Merchandise was always a few bucks cheaper than other stores when it came to TFs.

I bought Brainstorm, Blurr, Huffer, and a slew of others from Circus World.

 

I mainly went to Woolworth's, Child World, and Bradlees to get my G1's.

 

Consumers Distributing!! That was the name of it. Not merchandise.

 

Walmart X3!

 

DEKA dont ask

 

I remember going to Lionel, Childrens Palace, J.M. Fields and TG&Y to buy the G1 toys. Today, all those stores are gone.

 

Woolco
Simpsons
Consumers Distributing (catalogue)

 

I got many a G1 at Child World and Bradlees in NJ.

 

WOW I forgot about Consumers Distributing. Problem was though is that they were always out of stock! It was very frustrating going there.

 

Woolworths, Toymaster.  

Oh, and are Littlewoods still on the go?

 

Lionel Playworld, and Zayre.

 

Gemco! A few of you reminded me of that great store. Those were like the Super Walmarts of the 80s with groceries and department store in one. I don't ever remember getting TF's from there but I got other stuff and they always had a great selection. I kinda feel like Kohl's which carries TFs and stuff, reminds me of what Mervyn's used to be back in the 80's (and not what it was like right before they all closed recently). I went to Kohl's the other day with my mom and I was standing in line to buy stuff and I saw this little kid with his mom holding a TF2 Bumblebee while the mom was shopping. That was literally me like 25 years ago at Mervyn's. I miss those old stores  

 

For me it was:

Montgomery Wards, S.S. Kresge, Kingsway, and Kay-Bee Toys....

What was cool about the first three, (where I used to live in Detroit) is that they were all linked together at the corner of Grand River and Greenfield....you could go in S.S.Kresge's and then make your way into Montgomery Wards thru the glass doors that linked the two stores together, and then from Montgomery Wards, you could go upstairs and go across the bridge (that went over Grand River) right into Kingsway.....good times those were

 

Tons of stores have been covered in this thread, but Zayres really sticks out to me. I remember going there with my birthday money as a kid and buying Shockwave (who I still have proudly displayed in my collection). Ah, the good old days.

 

One store I used to frequent was called Die Hard Collectibles. I recall them saying they were moving just not sure where exactly.

 

Children's Palace (a super toy store and a whole lot more!)
KayBee Toys
Woolworth's
TG&Y