Sweetheart Corner sign stays as Clay Rite Aid site evolves

The heart-shaped Sweetheart Corner sign will stay at Route 11 and Taft Road as the old Rite Aid site moves toward a new use. The corner, on the Clay and North Syracuse border, has been empty since Rite Aid closed more than a year ago, and the exact tenant mix is still unsettled.

What is clear is that the parcel is headed toward a broader commercial reuse rather than a single vacant storefront. In late February, the property at 5380 W. Taft Road and 102 1/2 Wally Road sold for $4.9 million to 5380 Sweetheart Corner LLC, and the buyer is seeking a zoning change from the Town of Clay to regional commercial. Planning documents also suggest the Rite Aid building itself will remain and be repurposed, a sign the site may be divided among multiple businesses.

That shift is already visible on the property. A bright orange Spirit Halloween sign on the building points to one seasonal tenant, while Zaman Coffee House is expected to stay in the area. Together, those details suggest a plaza-like pattern of reuse rather than the one-store chain format that has occupied the corner for years.

The landmark sign carries its own local history. Tom Gelsomin said the family installed it in the early 1950s when they opened Sweetheart Market, after first running a custard shop. The Sweetheart name came from the family’s Sweetheart ice cream, and the sign remained even after the market closed in 2003, the building came down and a new drugstore went up in its place. The site was first an Eckerd and later became a Rite Aid.

The corner has long been more than a retail address. Syracuse.com has described Sweetheart Corner as a gathering place for generations of Syracuse youth, and the intersection has a reputation for drawing attention whenever a new project is proposed. In 2023, a drive-thru, carry-out-only Chick-fil-A proposal at the Basil Leaf Ristorante site ran into traffic concerns, with Clay Planning Commissioner Mark Territo saying impacts were a major sticking point before the plan stalled.

That history explains why the next steps at Sweetheart Corner matter beyond one shuttered drugstore. The zoning request now before Clay will help determine whether the property becomes a cluster of restaurants and shops or something smaller in scale, but the sign that made the corner famous will remain in place while that decision plays out.