Malls all died out 10-20 years ago with the advent of online shopping. Malls were all at the outskirts of town and their rents kept driving higher and higher, running small local businesses out. As online shopping gained traction, people decided they would rather wait a few days for what they wanted rather than deal with the hassle of driving 45 minutes to the mall for a few things.
I have never witnessed this supposed “dying out”. All the malls in my area are decked out for Christmas and have tons of people there all the time. I’ve been multiple times myself even in the last couple of months.
People always talk about this as a given, but I’ve never actually seen it. Ultimately, malls are one of the few remaining third spaces that you can be for free. That matters a lot.
My dad worked for an anchor tenant when i was in highschool. 7/10 of his stores were in malls with only the big box stores, nothing in the small store fronts
I’ve noticed here over the past few decades malls are closing but it started with the poorer (downtown) malls in the 90s and are closing almost perfectly along economic lines.
There are still some malls but the ones thriving seem to be fairly affluent, with Nordstrom & Coach stores. All the “middle class” malls look increasingly vacant and liminal, and the “poor” malls already closed.
There are replacement “lifestyle centers” and whatnot now, but the iconic mall from the 80’s is essentially dead. Most of them only had anchor tenants (Macy’s, Kohls, Dillards, Sears, JC Penny’s) 15 years ago when i was in highschool, and that trend has not gotten better.
Malls all died out 10-20 years ago with the advent of online shopping. Malls were all at the outskirts of town and their rents kept driving higher and higher, running small local businesses out. As online shopping gained traction, people decided they would rather wait a few days for what they wanted rather than deal with the hassle of driving 45 minutes to the mall for a few things.
I have never witnessed this supposed “dying out”. All the malls in my area are decked out for Christmas and have tons of people there all the time. I’ve been multiple times myself even in the last couple of months.
People always talk about this as a given, but I’ve never actually seen it. Ultimately, malls are one of the few remaining third spaces that you can be for free. That matters a lot.
My dad worked for an anchor tenant when i was in highschool. 7/10 of his stores were in malls with only the big box stores, nothing in the small store fronts
This is local anecdata but of the four main malls near me, only one has turned into a ghost town. The other three have thrived and they are hopping.
I’ve noticed here over the past few decades malls are closing but it started with the poorer (downtown) malls in the 90s and are closing almost perfectly along economic lines.
There are still some malls but the ones thriving seem to be fairly affluent, with Nordstrom & Coach stores. All the “middle class” malls look increasingly vacant and liminal, and the “poor” malls already closed.
Not just online shopping. The return of the strip mall. Just with a Starbucks to make it trendy.
Oh really wow, I never knew!
There are replacement “lifestyle centers” and whatnot now, but the iconic mall from the 80’s is essentially dead. Most of them only had anchor tenants (Macy’s, Kohls, Dillards, Sears, JC Penny’s) 15 years ago when i was in highschool, and that trend has not gotten better.
Lifestyle centers sounds like a lot of marketing speak.