When I was in Phoenix last month, I met a distant cousin for lunch at a restaurant next to a shopping mall. I was early, so I decided to take a walk around the mall - it was easy to walk, the place was nearly deserted. From what had originally been a two story mall with three anchor stores, there was one department store and a handful, maybe a dozen small stores left, and the department store was having a closing sale. In my lifetime I have seen enclosed shopping malls largely replace downtown department stores (the exception being densely populated urban centers in cities like New York, and Chicago where downtown stores survived.) And now the malls are closing. There are millions of square feet of empty shopping malls.
When my family started spending winters in Titusville, Florida - across the river from the Kennedy Space Center, I was thrilled, there were two shopping malls, one with Sears, and the other with JC Penny on one end, and Belk (a southern chain) on the other. All of those are now closed, one of the malls has been torn down and replaced with a handful of big-box stores.
What will retail look like in 10 years?
What will we do with the vacant shopping malls?
Two thought-provoking questions. I would imagine vacant shopping malls will mostly be razed for some other mega construction.
ReplyDeleteI live only 7 miles from king of prussia mall, the largest mall on the east coast. I never go there. I don't like the crowds/crime/carjackings. I buy either online or in local mom-n-pop shops.
ReplyDeleteWhat makes me angry is we have empty malls and retail space sitting, and yet we take more land to develop more retail space. Something's wrong here. Why are we not ulizling empty building and space first????
ReplyDeleteThis may sound petty, but I lost interest in malls once they got rid of the book stores.
ReplyDeleteI remember the downtown stores when I was but a young one. I guess that’s why I live shopping in New York. I still prefer shopping in person and frequent my nearest shopping mall whenever possible. It’s odd how Sears, the innovator of shopping by mail and one of the first death nails of small town storefront retail, became so outdated that online (read by mail) retail is their death nail. Wait...didn’t a hedge fund manager became their CEO?
ReplyDeleteTear them down for Starbucks or make jails out of them for political prisoners.
ReplyDeleteSoon, we will have chips implanted in our brains. We then access Amazon by mere thought and browse for what we want. Then we squint our eyes and think "buy." Our universal credit function will be on file and either pay for the item (in euros) or automatically obtain a consumer loan from Quicken. The item will then materialize on your home transporter pad. To return, blink twice and think "aw crap!"
ReplyDelete