Schulte and United both started as cigar stores but consolidated in 1928 in New York to build a national chain of five-cent to one-dollar stores. That same year, the newly formed company purchased this five-story structure at Franklin and Cass streets, known then as the Stovall-Nelson building, for an estimated $350,000. Originally named the Curry building, it was built in 1904 and was the tallest structure in Tampa then. The purchase was celebrated locally as Florida was in the middle of the land bust.

The building was then sold to a New York concern in 1931 following the bankruptcy of Schulte-United Inc., and was torn down in 1941 to make way for a new Art Nouveau JJ Newberry department store. Today the building has been vacant for the last several decades. Most of its Art Nouveau design has disappeared except for the rounded corners and the glass blocks still evident along Cass Street. Plans for restoration have come and gone several times.

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