Food Courts are Expanding

[Ferocitus]

I could have seen many being re-purposed a decade ago, but we're now way past
peak zombie apocalypse TV series.

 

[warpus]

Malls in North America serve as the "public square", where people can gather, eat, drink, spend time together, etc. Obviously also shop.

I don't mind them all dying out, 95% of the stores in malls sell stuff I would never be interested in. Vanity materialistic stuff.. There are some good stores here and there, but usually I'm only ever there when doing Christmas shopping, which.. I try not to, since I hate shopping and especially shopping when it's busy.. but malls are places where there's lots of stores in one place, and so a decent place to walk around and hopefully find something that a loved one wouldn't mind as a gift. I prefer "shopping districts" in urban settings, where you can walk down a street and visit stores along the way - but here in town we only have that sort of thing downtown, and it doesn't have too many interesting stores either. Honestly, most of my shopping is these days done online, and each time I'm in a mall I just cringe my way through the experience until it's over. They've been trying to repurpose our malls, and have been building more "smart" shopping centres instead, which makes sense since it's cheaper, but those are even worse car-oriented places with little thought given to the pedestrian.

So I'm all conflicted about all this obviously. On one hand if malls disappeared I wouldn't mind, but you gotta replace them with some sort of a "public square" equivalent. Power shopping centres aren't it, they're even worse.. South American cities have (for the most part) public squares here and there where people can congregate. I wish we adopted that approach here in North America, but it would involve public infrastructure investments, better public transit, and so on. Our public transit is slowly improving here in Canadian cities, but we're still a car oriented culture. It's slowly changing, maybe in a couple decades we'll get to a place where shopping malls don't exist aside from 1 or 2 novelty malls per city, and it's all replaced with pedestrian and public transit friendly squares / shopping districts

 

[aelf]

It's a thread... about... malls...

This forum can be really good at stereotype-busting.

But... yeah, YOU may have actually talked about malls the whole time, that's sort of the problem. I have not, and you seem to have somehow missed that, even though half of the discussion was me talking about how Germany's shopping landscape does not consist of huge america-style malls. We have small malls, if you can even call them that, and you usually find them in the middle of the city, "placed next to the highway"-style malls are not a thing in Germany, with some exceptions of course.

In any case, it's ironic that you accuse me of not reading your posts after completely missing that I was talking about shops in general, but anyway. As long und unnecessary this discussion was, I think we have now at least know that apparently we were talking past each other.

Why is there no digging smiley?

 

[Traitorfish]

But... yeah, YOU may have actually talked about malls the whole time, that's sort of the problem. I have not, and you seem to have somehow missed that,

In the short term, yeah. On a longer timescale, the malls will be demolished, and houses, or bureaus, or whatever else is required will take their place. Shops are just a waste of space. Especially big ones that come with parking spaces.

This discussion is a train-wreck, but I blame myself for not expecting it.

 

[Ryika]

Have you read what you quoted? I use the word shop right there. But sure, I guess blame's on me for using the words interchangeably at the beginning and not realizing that you're strictly speaking about huge malls built in the middle of nowhere, while I was speaking mostly about inner-city shopping centers. Go back to be beginning of the thread and read the discussion with that in mind, and you'll see why we were talking past each other.

Particularly post #9, which I understood as you differentiating between america-style malls and "shopping center"-type of malls (after all, you too used "shops" instead of malls), but apparently that last part was not actually meant as a separate comment on shops, but just a summary of the first paragraph, which is why my post #10 likely seemed like I was saying malls in the middle of nowhere would become something else, instead of "shopping center"-kind of malls inside of the city.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

When it comes to poorly thought out malls, South China Mall takes the Cake,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_China_Mall

I saw a video about that place. Some guy was actually trying to make a living there selling toys. He admitted he wasn't doing too well; fewer than half a dozen sales in a week, or something like that.

So they destroyed arable farmland to build that monstrosity, put it up in an area where nobody could afford to buy anything there, and then wondered why so few people took out leases or bought anything?

Sounds logical.

Malls in North America serve as the "public square", where people can gather, eat, drink, spend time together, etc. Obviously also shop.

I don't mind them all dying out, 95% of the stores in malls sell stuff I would never be interested in. Vanity materialistic stuff.. There are some good stores here and there, but usually I'm only ever there when doing Christmas shopping, which.. I try not to, since I hate shopping and especially shopping when it's busy.. but malls are places where there's lots of stores in one place, and so a decent place to walk around and hopefully find something that a loved one wouldn't mind as a gift. I prefer "shopping districts" in urban settings, where you can walk down a street and visit stores along the way - but here in town we only have that sort of thing downtown, and it doesn't have too many interesting stores either. Honestly, most of my shopping is these days done online, and each time I'm in a mall I just cringe my way through the experience until it's over. They've been trying to repurpose our malls, and have been building more "smart" shopping centres instead, which makes sense since it's cheaper, but those are even worse car-oriented places with little thought given to the pedestrian.

Our downtown used to be a vibrant place, even with the area where it wasn't a good idea to go. It was always busy during the day, and was safe to walk around there at night.

But gradually the major stores moved out to the malls and the smaller stores that depended on their foot traffic to bring these people downtown couldn't cope with the loss of shoppers. My favorite bookstore suffered this fate; I'd been a customer there since the mid-'70s when my grandmother told me that's where I could get Star Trek books, and they went out of business in the mid-'90s. I was there the last day they were open, and the guy who owned it (it was a family-owned business that had been started by his parents; the store was named after his mother) was talking to the long-time customers. By the time he got around to me, he was crying, I was crying, and it was a very sad day for everyone. First time a store owner ever hugged me; that place was one of the gathering places for the people downtown who liked to discuss the books they bought and read.

So I'm all conflicted about all this obviously. On one hand if malls disappeared I wouldn't mind, but you gotta replace them with some sort of a "public square" equivalent. Power shopping centres aren't it, they're even worse.. South American cities have (for the most part) public squares here and there where people can congregate. I wish we adopted that approach here in North America, but it would involve public infrastructure investments, better public transit, and so on. Our public transit is slowly improving here in Canadian cities, but we're still a car oriented culture. It's slowly changing, maybe in a couple decades we'll get to a place where shopping malls don't exist aside from 1 or 2 novelty malls per city, and it's all replaced with pedestrian and public transit friendly squares / shopping districts

I'm not sure what a "power shopping centre" is... like an overgrown strip mall, with a lot of "big box stores" congregated around a parking lot? We have that here. London Drugs moved there (the place where I buy my computers and get them repaired when things go wrong, since they do repairs on the premises instead of sending them away). There are a couple of places there that are interesting to browse in, but the parking lots there are not friendly to people like me, who need reasonably level surfaces to walk on that don't have pot holes or broken glass to maneuver around.

These are not places where I go to spend a lot of time wandering from store to store to browse. I go to individual stores to do specific things, and after that I want to leave. These are not relaxing places, even the Chapters store that actually has an area where people can sit and relax. I'd sit there and rest, but to crack open a book and read, or get into a conversation with someone? It just doesn't happen.

 

[warpus]

I'm not sure what a "power shopping centre" is... like an overgrown strip mall, with a lot of "big box stores" congregated around a parking lot?

Yeah, basically that. Wasn't sure what to call them. They're more like "Assorted parking lots and stores", a place you have to drive to, in the suburbs, and it has all the shopping options a mall might, but it's not a mall. I hate them because they're not pedestrian or public transit friendly at all.

 

[dutchfire]

This is the way I see it. Malls aren't dying. Ill-placed malls are dying. "If you build it, they will come" is not an adage that holds truth when it comes to shopping centers. Location and flexibility is important for a successful large-scale structure and the malls that do both those things well are malls that do very well in turn.

I suppose that a lot of the malls that are now old and dying are also in areas that were built in the same era, and that have suffered from white flight and/or ageing populating. That doesn't help with business.

 

[Traitorfish]

Have you read what you quoted? I use the word shop right there. But sure, I guess blame's on me for using the words interchangeably at the beginning and not realizing that you're strictly speaking about huge malls built in the middle of nowhere, while I was speaking mostly about inner-city shopping centers. Go back to be beginning of the thread and read the discussion with that in mind, and you'll see why we were talking past each other.

Particularly post #9, which I understood as you differentiating between america-style malls and "shopping center"-type of malls (after all, you too used "shops" instead of malls), but apparently that last part was not actually meant as a separate comment on shops, but just a summary of the first paragraph, which is why my post #10 likely seemed like I was saying malls in the middle of nowhere would become something else, instead of "shopping center"-kind of malls inside of the city.

Well, fine.

But the same principles apply. It still comes down to profit. The profit motive may coincidence more happily with efficiency in downtown areas of large, prosperous cities- but that does not describe a majority of the developed world, not even in Germany. Reclaiming old buildings, or old plots, requires investors to see it as profitable, and often as immediately profitable, which can't simply be assumed to manifest. And that's just to turn an old warehouse into bougie apartments or trendy offices; imagine the sort of profit-motive required to produce the sort of large-scale urban planning you imply. Drawing cities back into tight, pre-automobile cores, or allowing them to become diffuse and full of green pockets, or whatever combination therefore: that is a huge undertaking, and it's not one with a clear profit motive. Certain areas of a city may become fashionable as yuppy colonies, shopping or socialising districts, as main offices for fancy companies- but only so much of a city can fill that role. And if to the extent that this process leads buildings on the edge of town to become disused, few developers are going to exert themselves just to create a park or forest that represent a negative profit. Huge areas of cities, or even simply of middling towns, are going to remain semi-derelict, because it costs more to demolish buildings than to simply let them collapse, and even even more to do anything with the space.

You can appeal to "the long term", and you may occasionally even appear to be justified, but what you describe is going to require a change in urban policy at least as radical as anything seen in the twentieth century, and a government capable and willing to implement it. And, again- not even in Germany.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Well, fine.

But the same principles apply. It still comes down to profit. The profit motive may coincidence more happily with efficiency in downtown areas of large, prosperous cities- but that does not describe a majority of the developed world, not even in Germany. Reclaiming old buildings, or old plots, requires investors to see it as profitable, and often as immediately profitable, which can't simply be assumed to manifest. And that's just to turn an old warehouse into bougie apartments or trendy offices; imagine the sort of profit-motive required to produce the sort of large-scale urban planning you imply. Drawing cities back into tight, pre-automobile cores, or allowing them to become diffuse and full of green pockets, or whatever combination therefore: that is a huge undertaking, and it's not one with a clear profit motive. Certain areas of a city may become fashionable as yuppy colonies, shopping or socialising districts, as main offices for fancy companies- but only so much of a city can fill that role. And if to the extent that this process leads buildings on the edge of town to become disused, few developers are going to exert themselves just to create a park or forest that represent a negative profit. Huge areas of cities, or even simply of middling towns, are going to remain semi-derelict, because it costs more to demolish buildings than to simply let them collapse, and even even more to do anything with the space.

You can appeal to "the long term", and you may occasionally even appear to be justified, but what you describe is going to require a change in urban policy at least as radical as anything seen in the twentieth century, and a government capable and willing to implement it. And, again- not even in Germany.

Some cities either have, or are trying to, develop "pedestrian malls" outdoors, where no cars are allowed. Calgary has an area like this, and it's pretty nice. Of course the challenge is to keep things nice and not let the drug dealers and gangs take over. One of the areas I ventured into when wandering around downtown Calgary became the sort of place that it would be insane for any non-gang member to go.

 

[rah]

Location location location. We had one mall that was built on the edge of nowhere and it didn't really catch on, but 10 years later the metropolis has expanded enough that it is no longer on the edge but now surrounded. With the addition of a few extra restaurants it's doing quite well now.

 

[civvver]

Malls by me are around still but not nearly as busy as the last decade and there are always some empty shops and stores closing in them. People still like to retail shop but it has to be niche stuff and those stores usually do better in a strip mall with individual parking, not in a giant indoor mall. People still like boutique stores and stuff. They also like being able to buy online and pickup in store, so you can browse items at your leisure but still get it same day. I think that's where walmart, khols, target and a lot of other major retailers are shifting to. Target's are always busy here, helped in part by the in store starbucks at every one! People go there not just to shop but to kind of relax out of the house, get a coffee and wander the isles. Walmart is not relaxing like that but their pickup options work well.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Malls by me are around still but not nearly as busy as the last decade and there are always some empty shops and stores closing in them. People still like to retail shop but it has to be niche stuff and those stores usually do better in a strip mall with individual parking, not in a giant indoor mall. People still like boutique stores and stuff. They also like being able to buy online and pickup in store, so you can browse items at your leisure but still get it same day.

There's not much I want anymore that's important enough that I need it the same day that I decide to get it. Even when I order groceries, I have to allow for the possibility that I might not get same-day delivery.

I had to giggle a bit a few months ago when Staples had a sale on office chairs. I went to the store to try a few out (not gonna risk buying a chair online, and then discover it's uncomfortable or too flimsy to stand up to a lot of moving around). Later I mentioned this to the handi-bus driver, that I'd found one I was interested in but would order it online after getting home. The driver said he'd have allowed me to bring it on the bus (normally the rules say the drivers will not help carry stuff; the passenger is only allowed to bring what they can carry themselves), but I pointed out that there was no way I could have toted an office chair around the mall with me.

Target's are always busy here, helped in part by the in store starbucks at every one!

Where Canada is concerned, Target was nothing but a scam. Locally we lost our Zeller's store, which was a good place - decent merchandise at reasonable prices, with a cafeteria to grab a lunch or snack... and what took its place was an American outfit that had high prices, not much selection of items, no online sales for Canadians, and an overall really bad attitude. They screwed over their clerks and other employees when Target decided to pull out of Canada (and they never did understand why they failed here).

 

[warpus]

Target came into Canada and didn't do any market research at all. They just opened their stores and randomly priced everything, it seems. Nobody went shopping there because we have other stores selling the same stuff for cheaper.

Whoever was in charge of that expansion was a moron and probably still is.

 

[civvver]

People in the US love them. They are like smaller, trendier, nicer walmarts basically. Everything costs a little more but stuff like clothes and homewares are also nicer. Where they really corned the market though is moms cus they have the starbucks like I said and snacks for kids so you go there kind of for the experience. They try to making shopping comfortable and trendy.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

People in the US love them. They are like smaller, trendier, nicer walmarts basically. Everything costs a little more but stuff like clothes and homewares are also nicer. Where they really corned the market though is moms cus they have the starbucks like I said and snacks for kids so you go there kind of for the experience. They try to making shopping comfortable and trendy.

Starbucks here is located inside the local Chapters bookstore.

Walmart has McDonalds, so there's a place to sit and have a snack. If there's not too much of a lineup when I'm there I might pick up a couple of cheeseburgers now and then. I'm not a coffee drinker, so Starbucks isn't anything to write home about. I like the mint-flavored hot chocolate McDonalds has in winter, though.

 

[EgonSpengler]

The food court at one of the malls downtown was removed altogether and replaced with an Eataly.

 

[warpus]

People in the US love them. They are like smaller, trendier, nicer walmarts basically. Everything costs a little more but stuff like clothes and homewares are also nicer. Where they really corned the market though is moms cus they have the starbucks like I said and snacks for kids so you go there kind of for the experience. They try to making shopping comfortable and trendy.

That's not how they marketed themselves when they arrived in Canada, which might have been a part of the problem. Everyone expected competitive pricing. As soon as people realized that this wasn't the case, they stopped going there.

You can't just build up a brand loyalty in one country and then expect that to somehow magically exist in another. People are going to go where the cheaper prices are, unless you give them a good reason to go shop at your store instead, which they didn't.

Mind you I've been in targets both in Canada and the U.S., and I didn't get the "upscale" or "trendy" or "better than Walmart or Zellers" feel at all. Felt like just another store selling the same stuff everyone else is selling.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

That's not how they marketed themselves when they arrived in Canada, which might have been a part of the problem. Everyone expected competitive pricing. As soon as people realized that this wasn't the case, they stopped going there.

Yep. We were expecting lower prices (not dollar store kind of low, but reasonably lower), and a decent selection of merchandise. I was looking forward to online shopping, since this was a time when I'd moved to a new apartment and desperately needed more bookshelves. I found the perfect ones on the U.S. Target website. But then I found out that Canadians aren't welcome to shop on that website, and they had zero intentions of setting up a Canadian Target website. So I wrote to them and told them off, partly for their attitude toward disabled shoppers ("Can't you get someone to pick up the items for you?").

Well, no. Not everyone has someone to run and fetch for them, which is why I only shop at places with decent online/shipping policies. I won't set foot in Canadian Tire, for example, because they don't deliver. They don't seem to even understand the concept of a customer ordering an item, paying for it, and the store arranging to have the thing delivered.

You can't just build up a brand loyalty in one country and then expect that to somehow magically exist in another. People are going to go where the cheaper prices are, unless you give them a good reason to go shop at your store instead, which they didn't.

In addition to the prices not being lower, the complaint I heard most often was that the stores had very little merchandise on the shelves. It wasn't because people were buying them out - it was because they never put much out on the shelves to begin with.

 

[warpus]

Yeah, there wasn't much to the stuff they were peddling. It was incredibly poorly thought out as a business initiative, it's as if they said "Let's open some stores in Canada", threw some money at it, and put a pigeon in charge.