HomeDiagramsDatabaseMapsForum About
     

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions


Reply

 
Thread Tools Display Modes
     
     
  #1  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 6:44 PM
Yuri's Avatar
Yuri Yuri is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 4,478
Shopping Malls vs Strip Malls

Apparently shopping malls are declining all over the US. I couldn't find the exact figures, whether it's only some malls closing or if the whole model will become extinct in near future. As I live in a country where malls are still thriving and that was under a mall construction boom till few years ago, that's hard to conceive.

On the other hand, strip malls are becoming more popular and their numbers are growing. Why is that? Why is this model is superior to the other one? To me they look even more depressing and autocentric.
__________________
London - São Paulo - Rio de Janeiro - Londrina - Frankfurt
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #2  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 7:22 PM
Cory Cory is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Houston
Posts: 3,350
Strip malls are in and out.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #3  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 8:01 PM
pdxtex's Avatar
pdxtex pdxtex is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Portland, OR
Posts: 3,119
It probably has to do with price point. Large, luxury malls are doing the best but lower end malls have too much competition.
__________________
Portland!! Where young people formerly went to retire.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #4  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 8:32 PM
Thebestofeverything Thebestofeverything is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2021
Posts: 7
I think it has to do with convenience. Why trudge through a mall to find your store of choice in some corner or on some floor when you can just drive up to the store you want and get what you want and be on your way. And many millennials and gen z'ers don't even want to do this, when they can just order online and avoid the store altogether.

One trend that we do have that I did not see in Sao Paulo is we have big box stores surrounded by parking that offer goods in a large warehouse setting. We have plenty of these such Costco, Sams Club, Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes.

In the not too distant future, I can see the US having very few brick and mortar stores and those that do survive will be for the rich that can afford to pay for the personal experience that today is free and we take for granted. Everyone else for the most part will be buying online or going to a big box warehouse.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 10:04 PM
memph memph is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 1,854
Different kinds of tenants. Strip malls are more typically geared towards people running errands while shopping malls are for shopping. In case the difference isn't clear - shopping has more elements of a leisure activity, whereas running errands is more of a chore.

For running errands, you know what you want and don't want to spend more time than necessary looking for it, and won't be comparing items from different stores. This includes groceries stores most notably, as well as pharmacies, liquor stores, hardware stores, convenience stores, etc. Many personal services businesses are similar in that you only drive there to go to that one business, ex hairdressers, dentists, tax accountants, as well as restaurants. It's these sorts of businesses that do well in strip malls.

Shopping malls tend to have more businesses where customers might browse and compare products from different shops, not really knowing what they want until they see it. So they will have stores selling gifts, toys, jewelry, and of course shoes and clothes, as well as electronics and cosmetics. In America, much of the shoes and clothes aren't bought because people need them urgently but because they're bored of their old ones and want to keep up with the latest fashion trends.

In order to facilitate the experience of browsing from one shop to the next, shopping malls must have a pleasant environment connecting the shops, such as indoor climate controlled walkways with glass roofs, and ideally some seating for elderly customers, fountains, indoor plants, food courts, etc. This means higher maintenance costs, and consequently higher rents. Anchor tenants are also important for encouraging customers to walk from one end of the mall to the other, and pass the other stores in between and hopefully become tempted to buy something there.

On the other hand, with strip malls, you prioritize convenience by making it possible for customers to park as close as possible to the singular business they intend to patronize, rather than forcing them to walk across half the mall.

Factors that may be negatively impacting shopping malls

1. Competition from downtown revitalization, outlet malls and lifestyle centres, since they too aim to provide a similar experience

2. Lack of anchor tenants; the number of nice department stores is decreasing, in Canada, it's basically just The Bay, but most shopping malls were built in an era when you also had several chains, such as Sears, Zellers, Eatons, Woolco, Towers, Woodwards, Simpsons... As a results, malls find themselves with large spaces they don't have suitable tenants for. Some will fill it with a Wal-Mart, but that's geared towards a lower income clientele and more about running errands than leisure shopping. Or they'll bring in a grocery store, pet food store, home improvement store (ex Home Depot, Canadian Tire), or gym, but those are again not going to bring in customers looking to do leisure shopping across the rest of the mall. Some malls will bring in more niche upscale department stores, or foreign department stores. There was a lot of hope when Target announced they'd expand into Canada by buying up Zellers, but instead they pulled out in 2015 and instead of having Zellers anchor tenants (already not ideal since they're somewhat downmarket), now there was a big vacancy. And then Sears closed down 3 years later (2018). Simons, Saks, Nordstrom and Holt Renfrews are options for the more successful upmarket malls, while less successful ones have to settle for SportsCheck, Winners, or Homesense. Those 3 are not as ideal because they are smaller and don't really need all the space department stores used to occupy, and are also not as good for generating traffic across the mall. Some malls renovated the department store spaces to make spaces for movie theatres but that doesn't work as well now with movie streaming. Malls that renovated these anchor tenant spaces to for smaller tenant spaces or food courts might do better.

3. Suburban decline. Many of the malls and strip malls were built in inner suburbs that used to be middle or upper-middle class, but are now more working class. Since malls rely on customers with a certain amount of disposable income, these tend to struggle. Strip malls struggle less because they're more geared towards essential services, but even those that aren't are better able to transition into down-market strip malls. If shopping malls have vacancies or marginal businesses like pawn shops, stag shops, loan sharks, etc it will negatively impact all the other businesses, whereas with strip malls, it doesn't really matter.

4. Decline of middle class. Strip malls can survive on businesses that are more geared towards providing essential goods and services, but shopping malls not so much. Probably this is why shopping malls are consolidating into a small number of large regional malls that are geared towards a more affluent clientele (since the top 10% or so are still doing well, if not better). These are able to support niche upscale department stores, and therefore have 3-4 anchor tenants, while local malls decline.

5. Online shopping. I think this can affect all forms of shopping environments relatively equally though.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #6  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 10:16 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
Quote:
. I couldn't find the exact figures, whether it's only some malls closing or if the whole model will become extinct in near future
I think it's the traditional enclosed malls in particular having a hard time, and that isn't a new trend caused by the internet but instead started 20 years ago when big box chains started to expand. The dead mall phenomena started in the late 1990s when some of the really old malls from the 1950s that had passed on by competing shopping centers couldn't hold on anymore. Then the recession started killing off the small town malls. Another thing is there used to be a bunch of different regional department stores and then they all merged into Macy's and Dillard's.

What I've read in the news and what I've seen in articles quoting retail leaders is that large cities and some towns that function as commercial hubs for the surrounding region will be able to sustain 2-3 "super regional" or "luxury" malls while the rest will slowly go away, perhaps becoming other things like offices or warehouses or schools or medical clinics, etc. There was a time period when towns with about 50,000 or 60,000 people(like where I grew up, Killeen, TX) could have a mall with a 3 or 4 department store anchors but that is the past, I think this type of mall is the one that is disappearing the fastest and accounts for the statistics showing malls are dying. For what it's worth, when they were building those enclosed malls in the early 1980s there were far fewer strip malls or chains located outside of malls in these towns.

However as you said, strip malls continue to be built. Some struggling department stores that used to be mostly inside malls have found success with standalone stores outside of malls like JC Penney.

Also there's been a lot of new shopping centers built in the last 10 years that are basically malls but don't call themselves that. Suburban mixed use town center developments tend to have the same stores that used to be in malls except now they are outside. Also there are those Prime and Tanger Outlet centers.

Quote:
Everyone else for the most part will be buying online or going to a big box warehouse.
I think this is a bit dramatic. I'm a Millennial and my younger sister is Gen Z and we both still like to go to the store.

Ironically I went to a mall this afternoon, lol. Memorial City in Houston, which is one of 2 big malls in the central part of the city. It was built in 1959 but has changed a lot, not sure if any particular section of it is original at this point. I wanted to go in the Apple store to see what the iPhone 13 was like to physically hold in person, before I buy one. It was recently remodeled and almost all the storefronts are occupied. They recently tore down the empty Sears department store, there are plans to expand the mall out further. The place is huge, and anchored by a large medical center(the world's tallest hospital building in fact) as well as other high rise office, hotel, residential, etc.

That said, within a few miles of Memorial City there used to be several malls that are gone now. Town and Country, Northwest, Westwood are closed entirely. West Oaks is on it's last legs. Sharpstown became PlazAmericas.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #7  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 10:16 PM
Manitopiaaa Manitopiaaa is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: Alexandria, Royal Commonwealth of Virginia
Posts: 494
Shopping malls were made to be a "destination." You go a shopping mall and wander around, often into stores that you would otherwise never have gone into (bath soaps, candle stores). They're full of stores that survive financially based on impulse purchases.

South Park nails it: https://southpark.cc.com/video-clips...u-need-puppies

They have stuff you largely don't need and didn't know you needed.

Strip malls, meanwhile, are full of stores where you're going there on purpose. I don't wander around a strip mall. I'm going there to grab a sub sandwich, or run into Best Buy to grab a delivery. I park, run in, and dip out.

Malls relied on the "spectacle" of shopping, but people nowadays want convenience. They don't want to spend 3 hours trying to find a good T-Shirt when the Internet has now made it possible to buy what you want with ease.

It's another side effect of the Internet. In the 1980s you'd go the Mall because you were bored and wanted to burn 5 hours with your buddies. Now the Internet has made it immeasurably harder to be bored. When people can do something entertaining for cheap/easy they do so.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #8  
Old Posted Oct 16, 2021, 10:52 PM
Yuri's Avatar
Yuri Yuri is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 4,478
I really appreciated the insights posted here!

Given the answers, I guess the main difference compared to Brazil is street shops fulfill the purpose of strip malls, while shopping malls have the same function they have in the US: leisure and non-essential purchases.

As shopping malls are less numerous in Brazil (600 as 2021), I guess they can hold for a while or even indefinitely as you say the upscale malls will do in the US.
__________________
London - São Paulo - Rio de Janeiro - Londrina - Frankfurt
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #9  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 1:46 AM
Wigs's Avatar
Wigs Wigs is offline
Great White Norf
 
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Niagara Region
Posts: 10,820
The US is notoriously over-retailed.
Canada is too but not to the extent of USA.

Many malls and big box power centres will close in the coming years, especially with Amazon and other online shops "eating" into physical 'brick and mortar' retail sales.

imho, the destination malls with the 'flagship' retailers will probably survive, but there's a lot to be gutted on the lower-mid end.


Statista

Last edited by Wigs; Oct 17, 2021 at 2:33 AM.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #10  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 3:16 PM
DCReid DCReid is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2012
Posts: 1,049
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigs View Post
The US is notoriously over-retailed.
Canada is too but not to the extent of USA.

Many malls and big box power centres will close in the coming years, especially with Amazon and other online shops "eating" into physical 'brick and mortar' retail sales.

imho, the destination malls with the 'flagship' retailers will probably survive, but there's a lot to be gutted on the lower-mid end.


Statista
Interesting that it's the english speaking countries on the list that are well over-retailed. Here in south Florida, there are strip malls after strip malls on just about every main street. I don't see how all of the stores are surviving, and think many will have to close over the coming year - I actually hope so as I think most are ugly, they gobble up land with parking, and can be disruptive on traffic.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #11  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 3:50 PM
iheartthed iheartthed is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: New York
Posts: 9,787
Quote:
Originally Posted by Yuri View Post
I really appreciated the insights posted here!

Given the answers, I guess the main difference compared to Brazil is street shops fulfill the purpose of strip malls, while shopping malls have the same function they have in the US: leisure and non-essential purchases.

As shopping malls are less numerous in Brazil (600 as 2021), I guess they can hold for a while or even indefinitely as you say the upscale malls will do in the US.
The strip mall category is pretty broad. At one point they were just cheap commercial developments, mostly populated by boutique stores and restaurants. In the past couple of decades they have gotten more elaborate and are replacing the suburban shopping mall. For instance, I would consider both of these developments strip malls:

https://goo.gl/maps/yCQGrPYFi5XjNmoH6

https://goo.gl/maps/GL6dmBde2oRSrTg36
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #12  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 3:52 PM
EastSideHBG's Avatar
EastSideHBG EastSideHBG is offline
Me?!?
 
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Philadelphia Metro
Posts: 11,214
Here in the Philly area we are over retailed with both malls and strip malls and many of the enclosed malls are dying rapidly. Strip malls seem to be doing a little better but you can still find empty stores in many. One of the enclosed malls near me has tried a few reinventions (a doctor's office taking up some stores, etc.) but things rarely seem to stick. They have built on to the mall with outside only facing stores and they seem to be doing okay. It doesn't help these smaller malls that we have one of the largest shopping malls in the country that is a big draw, the King of Prussia Mall.

The enclosed shopping mall but missing most of the roof (I don't necessarily mean a lifestyle center but maybe?) is an even stranger concept to me because it functions exactly like the enclosed mall but is exposed to the elements and it's strange seeing a kiosk where the worker(s) is trying to navigate a rainy day or when it is 20F and cold or blisteringly hot. The one here in the Philly metro does well regardless but it's an outlet center and they usually draw a solid crowd.



__________________
Right before your eyes you're victimized, guys, that's the world of today and it ain't civilized.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #13  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 5:09 PM
llamaorama llamaorama is offline
Unicorn Wizard!
 
Join Date: Oct 2008
Posts: 4,204
There is one of those in Houston too, it looks essentially the same but has slightly different architecture. Ours looks a little more southwestern.

I like to buy my shoes from those places. They'll usually have a reebok, adidas, nike, store or whatever and they'll have everything on permanent sale for like $30.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #14  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 6:37 PM
mhays mhays is offline
Never Dell
 
Join Date: Jul 2001
Posts: 19,748
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wigs View Post
The US is notoriously over-retailed.
Canada is too but not to the extent of USA.

Many malls and big box power centres will close in the coming years, especially with Amazon and other online shops "eating" into physical 'brick and mortar' retail sales.

imho, the destination malls with the 'flagship' retailers will probably survive, but there's a lot to be gutted on the lower-mid end.


Statista
This is false. They seem to be only counting malls of various types.

The US number was 43 square feet per person pre-Covid, last I looked.

The other countries would often be much closer if they counted everything. Many countries have much more active storefront retail than we do on average.

(For the non-industry folks -- don't believe brokerage inventory stats. So many threads go sideways this way. And especially don't believe out-of-context clickbait from someone like Statista!)
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #15  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 7:47 PM
Doady's Avatar
Doady Doady is online now
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2004
Posts: 4,701
I think you are confusing strip malls with power centres. Power centres are larger and more concentrated, and full of chain stores, and they replaced the shopping mall. Strip malls are smaller, and have more mom-and-pop shops, more focused on essential goods rather than luxury goods. Like a shopping mall, the power centre serves a region or a city, while the strip mall serves the local community.

The power centre is associated with the "big box" store and the "category killers" which have replaced the department stores, and they are designed so that people drive from store to store. The shopping mall in contrast is associated with the department store, they are designed so that people park in one place and then walk between department stores, so as the department store died, the shopping mall also died.

I am not sure if the strip mall gained prominence or declined over the years, but they have definitely changed. Instead of lining major roads, they are now located at one corner of a major intersection. So you won't find roads lined with retail in new subdivisions today like in subdivisions in the past. No more retail "strips".
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #16  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 7:56 PM
Wigs's Avatar
Wigs Wigs is offline
Great White Norf
 
Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Niagara Region
Posts: 10,820
mhays, by all means please post the accurate numbers if you have time.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #17  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 8:28 PM
MolsonExport's Avatar
MolsonExport MolsonExport is offline
The Vomit Bag.
 
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Otisburgh
Posts: 44,716
I loathe power centres. Big Box Barf and soul-sucking parking lotlandia.
__________________
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."-President Lyndon B. Johnson Donald Trump is a poor man's idea of a rich man, a weak man's idea of a strong man, and a stupid man's idea of a smart man. Am I an Asseau?
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #18  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 8:29 PM
mhays mhays is offline
Never Dell
 
Join Date: Jul 2001
Posts: 19,748
I doubt there are accurate numbers. All we have are brokerage stats, which are incomplete at best, and count different things from one location to another. If they do exist, look for something that passes a BS test.

I do have Seattle stats based on CoStar (a paid service, so no link). They report 181,620,353 sf of retail in the three-county Seattle market. If you extrapolate a current population of 4,050,000, that's about 44.8 sf/person.

Last edited by mhays; Oct 17, 2021 at 9:15 PM.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #19  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 8:51 PM
Thebestofeverything Thebestofeverything is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2021
Posts: 7
Quote:
Originally Posted by llamaorama View Post
I think it's the traditional enclosed malls in particular having a hard time, and that isn't a new trend caused by the internet but instead started 20 years ago when big box chains started to expand. The dead mall phenomena started in the late 1990s when some of the really old malls from the 1950s that had passed on by competing shopping centers couldn't hold on anymore. Then the recession started killing off the small town malls. Another thing is there used to be a bunch of different regional department stores and then they all merged into Macy's and Dillard's.

What I've read in the news and what I've seen in articles quoting retail leaders is that large cities and some towns that function as commercial hubs for the surrounding region will be able to sustain 2-3 "super regional" or "luxury" malls while the rest will slowly go away, perhaps becoming other things like offices or warehouses or schools or medical clinics, etc. There was a time period when towns with about 50,000 or 60,000 people(like where I grew up, Killeen, TX) could have a mall with a 3 or 4 department store anchors but that is the past, I think this type of mall is the one that is disappearing the fastest and accounts for the statistics showing malls are dying. For what it's worth, when they were building those enclosed malls in the early 1980s there were far fewer strip malls or chains located outside of malls in these towns.

However as you said, strip malls continue to be built. Some struggling department stores that used to be mostly inside malls have found success with standalone stores outside of malls like JC Penney.

Also there's been a lot of new shopping centers built in the last 10 years that are basically malls but don't call themselves that. Suburban mixed use town center developments tend to have the same stores that used to be in malls except now they are outside. Also there are those Prime and Tanger Outlet centers.



I think this is a bit dramatic. I'm a Millennial and my younger sister is Gen Z and we both still like to go to the store.

Ironically I went to a mall this afternoon, lol. Memorial City in Houston, which is one of 2 big malls in the central part of the city. It was built in 1959 but has changed a lot, not sure if any particular section of it is original at this point. I wanted to go in the Apple store to see what the iPhone 13 was like to physically hold in person, before I buy one. It was recently remodeled and almost all the storefronts are occupied. They recently tore down the empty Sears department store, there are plans to expand the mall out further. The place is huge, and anchored by a large medical center(the world's tallest hospital building in fact) as well as other high rise office, hotel, residential, etc.

That said, within a few miles of Memorial City there used to be several malls that are gone now. Town and Country, Northwest, Westwood are closed entirely. West Oaks is on it's last legs. Sharpstown became PlazAmericas.
It's meant to be dramatic. Just as the generations prior to the millennials ended main street shopping (remember when department stores, men's and women's wear and five and dime stores lined the downtown streets of just about every city in the US), so will the current and future generations move away from brick and mortar stores in favor of online buying or big box warehouses. Some shopping malls and strip shopping will remain for various reasons (caters to the rich or provides services) but the majority of retail sales will be done online or big box. It may take a few decades to happen but it will happen.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #20  
Old Posted Oct 17, 2021, 9:29 PM
SFBruin SFBruin is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2015
Location: Seattle, WA
Posts: 1,189
I'm not entirely sure, but I assume that strip malls are easier to maintain.

You don't need to hire security (or, at least, not as much), there is less common-area to clean and restore, stores can manage their own storefronts, etc.

So, it might make sense to default to a strip mall for most locations.
__________________
Pretend Seattleite.
Reply With Quote
     
     
This discussion thread continues

Use the page links to the lower-right to go to the next page for additional posts
 
 
Reply

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions
Forum Jump


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 6:23 AM.

     
SkyscraperPage.com - Archive - Privacy Statement - Top

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.