Tear mall. Lose business. Walmart.

[Forevermarypoppins]

I live within 25 miles of quite a few indoor and outdoor malls. The one I frequent the most is the one I drive to, to walk. Sometimes I might stop and look around but not often. The biggest reason I have for not frequencing any mall is this, I don't like the variety of stores. There are many stores long gone that I really miss. When you can't go into 3,4,5 stores that you like all within a mall then why bother.

 

[MICKIMINI]

A cousin of mine closed a grocery store he owned in the Pittsburgh area a year or so again. He said theft was a major problem and he could not afford to "support" the thieves. There are many reasons for store to go away...

 

[Smugpugmug]

Part of the problem is that the mall stores mostly concentrated on young people, teens to twenties, and many if not most of those groups now shop mostly online. Also, the mall as a hang-out for same has mostly gone away as these same groups spend much of their time online which they can do from anywhere. How often have you gone to a fast food place and seen a group of teen's all on their phones and not talking to each other. The mall is dead until they find a way to attract other groups.

Every mall in my area has outright banned anyone under 18 unless accompanied by someone 21 and older so teens don't really hang out there anymore. They can't even go into the movie theaters without an adult either. But now all of those kids just loiter in the parking lot since they can't enter the actual mall.

 

[anrew]

I always prefer to buy things at small local stores rather than big shopping malls

 

[hardcorestitch]

Every mall in my area has outright banned anyone under 18 unless accompanied by someone 21 and older so teens don't really hang out there anymore. They can't even go into the movie theaters without an adult either. But now all of those kids just loiter in the parking lot since they can't enter the actual mall.

That’s a similar story at my local mall but only on Fridays and Saturdays after 4pm.

Then again… there are lots of more productive locations those folks can go like the YMCA or a rec center otherwise…

 

[Southernmiss]

People's preferences evolve, even for shopping.

I've really tried to shop local and in person for items and 9 times out of ten can't find what I'm looking for, kick myself for wasting time, and then go order online exactly what I'm looking for in the comfort of my own home, without having to look put together, and in a few days, the exact item I'm looking for is delivered to my door.

Christmas shopping was mostly done online. I only shopped in person twice. Everyone got exactly what they wanted, I only had 2 returns to make- online and saved so much time and money.

There is no way I could have purchased what my family needed/wanted in local stores.

I also found and purchased a pattern of discontinued Christmas plates to add to what I already had. These sets were delivered to me from individuals around the country. There's no way I'd have found them otherwise.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

the malls from the 80's and 90's by me are on life support. Except for 1 or 2 much larger malls that are stronger. The "new" mall in my area that is always packed is an outdoor/mixed use space. A lot of restaurants, on the higher point cost and higher end shops. There are very expensive condos above the shops and the mall has a great space for performances and events. If you don't arrive by 11 or earlier, you can't find a parking space. They're building another one of these malls on the other side of town.

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

What really doomed the mall was a combination of things.
1. Developers figured out with a strip shopping center, they don't have to pay to build, nor heat the common space. Just put it all in a strip mall for far cheaper.
2. As consolidation occurred in the retail industry, Malls became homogenous. The city I grew up in had 5 malls, all of them with a lot of unique shops in them. Yes most had the same majors, but the stores within were different and often local. Towards the end of the mall building phase, we had companies owning 8-9 different stores in the mall and being in every single mall in town driving up rents and pushing the locals out. We no longer had any incentive to go to a mall not near us.
3. Malls became young people unfriendly. They ceased being gathering spots. Let's go hang out at the strip shopping center just doesn't have the same lure. There aren't any gathering spots in them. Further, on-line gathering spots filled the void as did on line shopping
4. Predators that used debt to gobble the competition met bigger predators who destroyed them. Vulture capitalists bled them dry, sold off their profitable brands and left a dead husk behind. Many of these were mall anchors. The rising new stores didn't locate in malls.

People's preferences evolve, even for shopping.

I've really tried to shop local and in person for items and 9 times out of ten can't find what I'm looking for, kick myself for wasting time, and then go order online exactly what I'm looking for in the comfort of my own home, without having to look put together, and in a few days, the exact item I'm looking for is delivered to my door.

That's the thing. Everyone says buy local. But the only local shops we have are boutique and niche and usually higher end stuff. In many of the larger cities, there are some good local restaurants. But in the burbs, chains dominate. And even in a city like Vegas, celebrity chef places are pushing out locals. And prices are just way out of line. And even in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, the celebrity chefs and chains are starting to move in. Faux Kountry Kookin is pushing country cooking to the curb. And even in San Francisco, many of the better reasonably priced seafood restaurants are gone, replaced by tourist traps serving over priced and under portioned poor quality fru fru corporate crap that isn't worth your time in Kansas, let alone San Francisco.

 

[barkley]

Are Outlets considrered malls? And further what is obsession with the outlets, I never seem to find any great deals at least for thing I go for.

we lived near an outlet mall in the 90's and 2000's-the most frequented stores by the locals were (in no particular order)-

bath and bodyworks (fraction of the store cost even at their best sales)

Harry and David's (all those baskets they sell online were torn open and the contents sold for 10% of what they sold individually online, their awesome pears were not much more than the supermarket sold pears for, I still miss those pears and some of the jams)

Mikasa (back then registering for china was still popular and you could fill your set in to completion at a fraction of the price)

Disney (after any holiday anything themed with that was rock bottom prices, if you were going to Disneyland you snagged souvineers and clothing so you spent 80% less than in the parks).

the tourists fed into the bulk of the stores.

 

[MICKIMINI]

we lived near an outlet mall in the 90's and 2000's-the most frequented stores by the locals were (in no particular order)-

bath and bodyworks (fraction of the store cost even at their best sales)

Harry and David's (all those baskets they sell online were torn open and the contents sold for 10% of what they sold individually online, their awesome pears were not much more than the supermarket sold pears for, I still miss those pears and some of the jams)

Mikasa (back then registering for china was still popular and you could fill your set in to completion at a fraction of the price)

Disney (after any holiday anything themed with that was rock bottom prices, if you were going to Disneyland you snagged souvineers and clothing so you spent 80% less than in the parks).

the tourists fed into the bulk of the stores.

Oh, those H & D pears from 20+ years ago were magical...the last ones we bought a few years ago were exactly as you describe: supermarket pears!

 

[georgina]

Gee, I haven't lived in the Pittsburgh area for 5 years, thought the Monroeville Mall was dead a long time ago. There was one called Pittsburgh Mills that opened in 2005, it started going downhill not too long after, though the movie theater was still open I think. As far as I know Ross Park Mall is still going.

Malls are a good place to kill some time walking, but I don't shop in them. Drove a friend to a doctor appt today and spent half hour walking the mall nearby, many of the stores are the same as when my 30 yo DD was a teenager.