The Daily Mall Reader: Shopping Malls Grow With Suburbs

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Flight To The Suburbs"
Business Must Follow The Dollar

TIME Magazine - Monday, Mar. 22, 1954

(Excerpt) The enormous growth of the U.S. population has meant vast new markets in everything from baby carriages to washing machines and wrist watches. Will every retailer cash in on the bonanza? Not at all. The reason is that since 1940, almost half of the 28 million national population increase has taken place in residential suburban areas, anywhere from ten to 40 miles away from traditional big-city shopping centers. Thus, to win the new customers' dollars, merchants will have to follow the flight to the suburbs.

In the ten years from 1940 to 1950, St. Louis' suburbs grew 48% while the city itself added only 6% to its population. In the same period, Philadelphia's suburbs expanded twice as fast, Boston's eight times as fast, as their already-crowded metropolitan districts. The numbers tell only part of the story. Suburbia offers not only more new customers but better customers.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Kresge & Kmart, Woolworth & Woolco, And Grant Too

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Strength in Variety"

TIME Magazine - Friday, Nov. 20, 1964

(Excerpt) S.S. Kresge is a man as well as a variety store, and, at 97, he was recently called out of retirement to address the annual meeting of the chain that he forged. While stockholders applauded, old S.S. (for Sebastian Spering) got up and exhorted them to make Kresge "an outstanding five-and-ten-cent syndicate."

That did not jibe with President Harry B. Cunningham's idea of his job, and he rose to his feet and said so. Smilingly, he reminded everyone that the nation's third largest variety chain (after F.W. Woolworth and W.T. Grant) has expanded far beyond its old dime-store stage and is, in fact, quite a different creature. This small semantic difference highlights a new philosophy that has set all the variety chains off on their biggest spree of change and expansion.

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The Daily Mall Reader: Tanforan Mall Redevelopment

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"CASE STUDY: Tanforan Turnaround"

Retail Traffic - September 1, 2005

(Excerpt) The site of the new Shops at Tanforan in San Bruno, Calif. was a retail developer's dream.

Located five miles south of San Francisco, in an area where the average household income is $90,000, it housed an underused mall known as the Tanforan Shopping Center — a real fixer-upper.

Even though the mall was more than 30 years old and half-dark, its Sears anchor was ranked in the top five performing stores nationally, says Greg Wattson, senior vice president of the mall's redeveloper, Wattson Breevast LLC. “We knew that the customers were coming to the mall anchors,” says Wattson. “Our challenge was to make them stay longer and spend time in the mall proper.”

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Vintage Shopping Malls Out Of Fashion?

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"More competition brings less hope for older, enclosed"

Specialty Retail - July, 2002

(Excerpt) Once-thriving malls across the nation are closing their doors, being demolished, or shutting down entire wings without any concrete plans for redevelopment. These malls, now considered dinosaurs in the retail industry, are battling for business against glitzier, more modern shopping centers, big box retailers, redeveloped main street shopping districts, discounters and entertainment centers.

Traditional malls are undergoing changes of use to storage, university classrooms and new forms of retail. Recently, malls in Landover, MD, Ogden, UT, Muskegon, MI and Johnstown, PA have closed, a mall in Durham, NC is losing its anchor store, while a pair of regional malls in Toledo, OH and one in Oak Ridge, TN are treading water just to stay afloat. A declining mall in Spotsylvania, VA is hoping that the addition of a Costco will help revive the site. The Landover Mall in Landover, MD, once one of the region’s first and largest enclosed shopping malls, closed late May.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Fall Of The Mall

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"The fall of the mall: We are still shopping, but the citadels of retail are fast becoming irrelevant"

The National Post - June 15, 2004

(Excerpt) My first and last visit to the gigantic West Edmonton Mall, around 1990, compressed into two hours the feelings that people have been reporting since the original enclosed shopping mall opened in a Minneapolis suburb in 1956. First there was fascination, then a certain amusement (how often do you see an indoor swimming pool with a sandy beach and a wave machine?) and finally ennui. It was a fast-forward history of suburban retailing; West Edmonton, which is just like a mall only more so, demanded attention, then quickly deadened it.

It now seems possible that West Edmonton Mall and lesser citadels are on their way to becoming historical artifacts. No one could have predicted this three decades ago, when surveys said that Americans spent more time at the mall than anywhere else except home and work, and The Economist praised the controlled environment of malls as a "potent device for generating sales."

Today we are apparently living through the twilight of the malls. They remain essential in many places, and some still prosper, but they long ago lost the charm of novelty, and social change has eroded their economic base.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Malls Marketing For The Net

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"How The Net Is Remaking The Mall'"
To lure Web-savvy shoppers, retailers are turning to "lifestyle centers"

BusinessWeek - May 9, 2005

(Excerpt) The landscape of America is the store. Drive anywhere, and you will see mile after mile of mammoth malls, big-box retailers, and local supermarkets. There are more than 1.1 million retail establishments across the country, an average of one every three square miles.

Now this sprawling tapestry of retail space is being rapidly rewoven. In 2004 developers poured $18 billion into new and renovated enclosed malls, open-air shopping centers, and warehouse stores, up 17% from the previous year. So far, 2005 is ahead of that pace, in part as a response to the continued strength of consumer demand.

But there's something new going on as well: Bricks-and-mortar retailing is furiously recasting itself to compete in the world of the Internet.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Garden State Plaza, A Potemkin Mall

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"Welcome to the Potemkin Mall"

The New York Times - December 20, 2005

(Excerpt) PARAMUS, N.J. - At the Garden State Plaza, a sprawling marble and skylight-filled shopping center just outside Manhattan, discriminating consumers can find a $400 fur-trimmed handbag at Coach, a $60 pair of distressed jeans at American Eagle Outfitters and a $25 make-your-own giraffe at Build-a-Bear.

And, if they look closely enough, they can also find dozens of retail analysts, hedge fund managers and institutional investors, their telltale briefcases and BlackBerries in hand, as they rummage through clothing racks to calculate markdowns, count shoppers to gauge a chain's popularity and quiz managers about sales.

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The Daily Mall Reader: Gruen & Retail Shopping Nirvana

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"Filling the Doughnut"

TIME Magazine - Friday, Apr. 20, 1962

(Excerpt) For years, downtown storekeepers in the nation's cities have been standing morosely watching all the ladies go by—to the suburban shopping centers. It is the city's biggest dilemma in the age of the automobile: the stores have the goods, but where does the shopper park? After a few more years of this, says Planner-Architect Victor Gruen, the cities of America are going to be like doughnuts—"all the dough on the outside, and a hole in the middle."

To Victor Gruen, 58, a lively Vienna-born leprechaun, solving the problems of the deteriorating downtown has become something of an obsession. The automobile, he says, is downtown's most virulent enemy. "No automobile—not even the most elegant Cadillac—ever bought a thing." Dismount the shopper, free him of driving and parking worries, give him a modern version of the old town square, and the city will be born again.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Monroeville's Miracle Mile

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"Still going strong at 50: Location, adaptation aid Miracle Mile's success"

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - Wednesday, December 01, 2004

(Excerpt) Monroeville's Miracle Mile wasn't the first or the biggest or most innovative shopping center, but it has thrived.

In a business that favors the new and the trendy, Miracle Mile is observing its 50th year.

Now the Casto-Silken Group is investing in improvements to enhance the curb appeal and maintain its popularity.

"Miracle Mile is one of the pre-eminent power strip centers in the Pittsburgh region," said broker Herky Pollock, of CB Richard Ellis/Pittsburgh, a commercial real estate brokerage. "Historically, it's been one of the entry points for national retailers in the Pittsburgh market."

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Laurel Mall Redevelopment

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"New Owners to Bring New Life to Laurel Mall"

Washington Post - Monday, February 5, 2007

(Excerpt) The owners of Laurel Mall last week announced a plan to turn the ailing shopping center into a walkable town center with restaurants, a movie theater and national chain retailers.

The mall has been a sore spot on Route 1 in Prince George's County for years, steadily losing traffic and tenants. Sixteen percent of store space is empty, mall owners said, with Macy's, Burlington Coat Factory and International Furniture Liquidators as anchors.

Last year, real estate investment firms Somera Capital Management of Los Angeles and AEW Capital Management of Boston bought the center for $31 million from Blackstone Group of New York. The mall had encountered financial troubles and was placed in a court-appointed receivership the year before.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Winrock Center Redevelopment

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Winrock's full-circle face lift"
Tired of being called "Windy-Rock," the open-air shopping center got walled-off and air-conditioned in 1975, one of many makeovers since it opened in 1961. But now those walls are coming down.

Albuquerque Tribune Online - August 19, 2002

(Excerpt) Winrock Center has gone through a multitude of phases and changes in its 41 years. Its next big transformation is set to begin soon, with a wrecking ball.

Winrock's owners plan to turn the state's third-largest mall into an open-air, urban-feeling shopping and office complex.

"This is a new trend that, based on consumer demand, we're moving toward," said Shelton Weeks, general manager of the 900,000-square-foot Albuquerque shopping center. "We're moving toward what we would call a new urbanism or what we call a live-work-play environment."

The new "The Avenue-Winrock" will be an open-air center reminiscent of a downtown shopping district. It will have two "avenues" splitting it in three quadrants. At their axis will be a remodeled Dillard's department store.

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The Daily Mall Reader: Discount Megamalls

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"The Price Is Always Right"

TIME Magazine - Monday, Dec. 17, 1990

(Excerpt) Psssst! Want a deal on some Jordan Airs? Joan & David pumps? A Donna Karan dress? The latest Sony tape deck? Without slogging through the sales racks at five different department stores? And in a place where the teenagers can hang out and Dad can catch a football game on TV? Well, here's a concept in shopping-till-you're-dropping, just in time for Christmas and the recession: megamalls with maxi discounts.

Step into Florida's Sawgrass Mills, the world's biggest outlet-and-discount mall. Situated 15 miles west of Fort Lauderdale, it boasts 2.2 million sq. ft. of name-brand shopping at no-name prices. The parking lot alone covers 170 acres. Two miles of storefronts, 150 in all, include outlets for such status labels as Ann Taylor, Maidenform, Van Heusen, American Tourister and Athlete's Foot, plus such familiar discount stores as Brands Mart and Marshalls.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Shopping Malls And Consumerism

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"More competition brings less hope for older, enclosed"

Specialty Retail - July, 2002

(Excerpt) Once-thriving malls across the nation are closing their doors, being demolished, or shutting down entire wings without any concrete plans for redevelopment. These malls, now considered dinosaurs in the retail industry, are battling for business against glitzier, more modern shopping centers, big box retailers, redeveloped main street shopping districts, discounters and entertainment centers. Traditional malls are undergoing changes of use to storage, university classrooms and new forms of retail.

Recently, malls in Landover, MD, Ogden, UT, Muskegon, MI and Johnstown, PA have closed, a mall in Durham, NC is losing its anchor store, while a pair of regional malls in Toledo, OH and one in Oak Ridge, TN are treading water just to stay afloat. A declining mall in Spotsylvania, VA is hoping that the addition of a Costco will help revive the site.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Lloyd Center Consumer's Cornucopia

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"The Cowboy's Dream"

TIME Magazine - Monday, Aug. 08, 1960

(Excerpt) To the blare of bands and the fluttering of banners, 700 pigeons winged into the sky over Portland, Ore. last week to carry the good news to 29 Oregon and Washington cities. The news: the opening this week on the east bank of Portland's Willamette River of the sprawling (50-acre), $100 million Lloyd Center, the largest urban shopping center ever built in the U.S.

Only five minutes away from the traditional downtown "core" shopping area of Portland, Lloyd Center is a consumer's cornucopia. Its more than 100 retail stores are carefully clustered in competing groups (e.g., hardware, dresses) so that bargain hunters can save shoe leather. The sculpture and mobiles of Northwestern artists dot the landscape, and no flashy advertising or jutting store signs are permitted. Lloyd's has an ice-skating rink with live music, professional offices, seven restaurants, is dominated by the new 300-room Sheraton-Portland Hotel.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Big Town Mall Coming Down

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"Mall was 'the place to be'"
Long past its prime, Big Town coming down in Mesquite

The Dallas Morning News - Friday, July 28, 2006

(Excerpt) MESQUITE – Big Town was big news.

The first enclosed and air-conditioned shopping mall in the Southwest, the 77 ½-acre "City of Shops," drew crowds too big to count when it opened on a Thursday in late February 1959.

The Mesquite icon boasted not only a shopping utopia, but a small amusement park and a cartoon theater for kids. The Dallas Morning News ran a 24-page section on the opening, making that day's edition the largest weekday publication of the newspaper to date.

But through the decades, the crowds that once formed human traffic jams thinned to clusters of bargain shoppers and strings of mall walkers. Eventually, it attracted more folks thrilled to sneak inside an abandoned mall for snapshots of its morgue-like corridors than consumers ready to open their wallets at the remaining stores. When demolition crews began knocking down the peripheral walls late last week, it was a formality for a destination long ago declared dead.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Lafayette Place

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Design for Shopping"

TIME Magazine - Monday, Apr. 28, 1975

(Excerpt) A 15-year urban renewal splurge has left Boston's government and financial districts strong and healthy, but the city's neglected downtown retail center has stagnated as established stores have followed the middle classes to the suburbs. Last week Boston joined with Jordan Marsh, the city's biggest department store, and Sefrius Corp., a French syndicate, in a bold attempt to change the situation. Their plan: to build a $220 million project called Lafayette Place that is designed to make downtown shopping attractive once more.

An important part of the developers' strategy is to make it easy for shoppers to get to—and around—the twelve-acre project. There will be a 1,500-car parking garage for suburbanites and, for city dwellers, a direct underground link to the existing subway system. Once at Lafayette Place, shoppers will be able to move from store to store at three levels: in a subterranean concourse, on ground level and, by way of flying bridges, on the second floor.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Big Retailers Bypass Woodville Mall

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Big retailers bypass Woodville Mall environs"

toledoblade.com - Tuesday, May 15, 2007

(Excerpt) The Woodville Mall in Northwood is up for sale, and it is surrounded by plenty of vacant space.

But retailers are bypassing Woodville Road near the mall, many of them in favor of Navarre Avenue in Oregon. Among companies making that choice are Meijer, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., and recently, Menards.

The mall area did attract one new retailer, Steve & Barry's University Sportswear, which moved in last fall.

"I don't know why it is. … I wish I had a magical answer and I would suggest a solution" for why Woodville Road east of I-280 isn't growing, said Northwood Mayor Mark Stoner.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Kmart Bargains

A daily dose of mall-related reading...

"Bargains with Few Frills"

TIME Magazine - Monday, Aug. 25, 1980

(Excerpt) Other department stores may try to win back recession-scarred consumers with glamorized décor, personalized service and accordion-like credit arrangements. But K mart Corp, knows that the way to the shopper's heart is still through the pocketbook. Most of the 1,750 stores around the country that show off the company's big red K are riding out the recession relatively well, and the discount chain may displace Sears, Roebuck and Co. as the U.S.'s leading retailer.

K mart has prospered because of a no-frills policy that places the premium on value. In stores that usually have the ambience of a supermarket, customers can wander amid clothing, lawn chairs and stereos, rarely encountering a sales assistant. But the prices, as much as 15% below those at tonier stores, make up for the inconvenience.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: J. L. Hudson Company Customers King! (in 1961 anyway)

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"No Embarrassed Customers"

TIME Magazine - Friday, Jun. 02, 1961

(Excerpt) Into the downtown Detroit department store of the J. L. Hudson Co. stomped an outraged customer, demanding to return a suit that he had bought a year before. He had just got around to taking it out of the box in which it was delivered. "Now look at it," he fumed. "It's wrinkled." Where most department stores might have offered a free pressing, Hudson's complaint department without a murmur refunded the full purchase price of the suit.

This attitude, the product of a scrupulously enforced rule that "the customer must never be embarrassed," has helped make the 80-year-old J.L. Hudson Co. a Detroit legend—and one of the nation's most successful retailers.

Read the full article here.

The Daily Mall Reader: Downtown Chicago Shopping

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"Chicago's Magnificent Mile"

TIME Magazine - Monday, Dec. 06, 1971

(Excerpt) Downtown business districts have been losing customers to fast-growing suburban shopping centers, but a lively exception is Chicago's North Michigan Avenue. During the past decade, $2 billion worth of construction has risen on and near North Michigan, which Chicagoans call "the Magnificent Mile." California's Magnin has just opened a branch there, joining already established Bonwit Teller and Saks Fifth Avenue of New York, as well as such fashionable shops as Tiffany and Cartier. Soon they will be joined by Dallas' Neiman-Marcus.

Two weeks ago came the biggest news of all. Chicago's retailing giant, Marshall Field & Co., whose main store in the Loop on State Street is scarcely a mile away, and New York's Lord & Taylor announced that they will both open branches in Water Tower Plaza, a $100 million shopping, hotel and apartment complex that will go up on the avenue.

Read the full article here.