Harvard Avenue Business Closings in Allston

Two more longtime Allston businesses on Harvard Avenue are closing this fall: The Pet Shop at 165 Harvard Ave. will close on Sept. 30, and Blanchard’s Liquors at 103 Harvard Ave. plans to close in mid-to-late October, according to Allstonia, the latest departures from one of Boston’s busiest neighborhood commercial strips.

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An employee at Blanchard’s confirmed the closure last Wednesday as signs reading “Fall 2026, Store Closing, All Inventory Discounted” went up in the windows, Boston.com reported. No final day has been set for the 8,000-square-foot store.

Blanchard’s Closing After Decades on Harvard Avenue

Owner Chris Corey told staff in an email about two months ago that the business “has been a part of my family since 1954,” calling the decision “incredibly hard,” according to Boston.com, which said the closure follows years of declining sales and recent management departures. WCVB reported that the Blanchards name dates to 1838, when the first store opened in Scollay Square, and that there are currently seven Blanchards stores in the Metro Boston area; the announced closure applies to the Harvard Avenue store.

The Pet Shop and the Gordon Building Sale

The Pet Shop’s exit is tied to a bigger change on the block. Alpha Management Corp. bought the Gordon building at 149-175 Harvard Ave. in June, adding roughly two dozen storefronts to the nearly 20 it already owned on the street, and began raising rents—tripling some—The Boston Globe reported in August. The Globe said The Pet Shop was preparing to move out and that Regeneration Tattoo had already closed.

Alpha attorney and spokesperson Bob Allen told the Globe that many Gordon tenants still pay below Harvard Avenue’s average of $40 to $60 per square foot per year. Local business leaders said they have heard little about the new owner’s plans; Allston/Brighton Chamber of Commerce president Ben Franco said he had not heard Alpha “articulate a vision” for future tenants.

Our Take: Allston Is Changing, and Boston Should Plan for It

This section is analysis and opinion from The Boston Report.

Neighborhood retail always turns over, and not every closing is a crisis. Blanchard’s owner points to falling sales, and Allston’s customer base is shifting: business owners told the Globe they are seeing less late-night and international-student traffic, and the paper documented a wave of new Korean fried chicken chains and overseas boba brands. New businesses opening is a sign of demand, not decline.

What concerns us is the pace and the concentration. When one landlord controls dozens of storefronts on a single avenue and resets rents at once, the result can be a street of national chains and vacancies rather than a gradual mix of old and new. Independent anchors like a 70-year-old liquor store or a long-running pet shop are the “destination” businesses that bring people to the rest of the block. Allston is already pushing back on the loss of basic services, as seen in the fight over a proposed post office closure, and the neighborhood’s quality-of-life complaints, highlighted during Boston’s urban rat summit, are well known. The city’s Main Streets program and small-business office could help by tracking vacancies on Harvard Avenue, pushing for transparent leasing plans from large landlords, and helping displaced tenants find nearby space. Customers who want the old Allston to survive can do their part, too: shop at the independents that remain.

Sources

Allstonia (allstonia.com)
Boston.com (boston.com)
WCVB (wcvb.com)
The Boston Globe (bostonglobe.com)

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Allston Harvard Avenue Business Closings Add Up This Fall