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Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#21

Post by wil421 »

blackearl wrote: post #5

Malls need to be remade. I like the few I've gone to that are mostly outside or have some open airways and greenery, art, music, some sort of novelty event or thing to check out. I don't really miss giant generic malls at all. They're used more as a free babysitter and I hate visiting them.

Agreed. The more popular new shopping areas I’ve been are outdoor “malls”. Shopping mixed with outdoors, and as you said greenery, art, music and novelties.

A lot of indoor malls are dying. I can remember when the same empty places exploded in the 90s.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#22

Post by hsbauauvhabzb »

echelon wrote: post #4

I have trouble buying clothes online. It's hard to determine fit, shipping things back is a hassle beyond comprehension, and it's impossible to try things on (which is fun). Malls need to improve along a number of dimensions. Better dining, easier transportation or integration into live / work / play mixed use, and addition of grocery stores would make them better than Amazon. Add a Target to any mall and it's twice…

> I have trouble buying clothes online. It's hard to determine fit, shipping things back is a hassle beyond comprehension, and it's impossible to try things on (which is fun).

Same. Given we now have depth sensors and 3D modelling capabilities in our phones, sounds like something a disruptive startup could solve.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#23

Post by Nasrudith »

flubert wrote: post #13

"Malls are dying" seems like a "the suit is back" sort of meme. I've literally been hearing this for 20+ years. And the mall near me seems busier than ever. Someone must be pushing this for some reason. People shorting mall real estate?

The reason seems to be provincialism and extrapolation of their lived experiences as universal. One thing I noticed with relatively little travel in my life is that the one thing you cannot tell easily is if something in your home region is common in other places.

The suit may well have a stake through its heart on the west coast. It never died in the east coast mega-metrapolisis group from Wall Street/NYC and Washington DC setting the norms.

Similiarly suburban malls are generally either sickly at best or maybe a bunch of high end outlets /might/ survive or could go the way of strip malls in a few decades. Urban malls tend to be vibrant in comparison as the limited big box store viability means that if it isn't viable to do a particular store at street level retail small stores for whatever reason the mall is the perfect place to locate them.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#24

Post by flubert »

ZanyProgrammer wrote: post #19
flubert wrote: post #13

"Malls are dying" seems like a "the suit is back" sort of meme. I've literally been hearing this for 20+ years. And the mall near me seems busier than ever. Someone must be pushing this for some reason. People shorting mall real estate?

They are? Just search for dead/abandoned mall videos on YouTube. No shortage of malls declining.

Is there a good way to quantify? There are also endless youtube videos of all manner of abandoned structures in Detroit, but I don't know that extrapolates to things outside of Detroit for example.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#26

Post by Nasrudith »

hsbauauvhabzb wrote: post #22
echelon wrote: post #4

I have trouble buying clothes online. It's hard to determine fit, shipping things back is a hassle beyond comprehension, and it's impossible to try things on (which is fun). Malls need to improve along a number of dimensions. Better dining, easier transportation or integration into live / work / play mixed use, and addition of grocery stores would make them better than Amazon. Add a Target to any mall and it's twice…

> I have trouble buying clothes online. It's hard to determine fit, shipping things back is a hassle beyond comprehension, and it's impossible to try things on (which is fun). Same. Given we now have depth sensors and 3D modelling capabilities in our phones, sounds like something a disruptive startup could solve.

The closest I have seen is in an online store for glasses whose name I cannot recall but might have some spam in my inbox from. They do a decent job with a "printed ruler for scale on your face plus phone camera" to do a "photoshop job" to show the look but not the feel yet. They also just don't seem to get that I buy eyeglasses mostly based upon perscription change and that after I buy is the worst time to send me ads.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#27

Post by quickthrowman »

flubert wrote: post #20
theresistor wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to work next to a mall that literally went out of business and was torn down. The mall in my hometown has the highest vacancy rate I've ever seen. My guess is that they are collectively dying, but that the severity of symptoms is not evenly distributed.

In our current "age of big data" is there a source of data that would show the number of malls as a function of time? It would also be interesting to know the trend of vacancy in malls over time, and things like average number of outlets in malls over time. Where would someone mine data like that?

Not sure where you could get it for free, but info like this is collected by companies and sold to people who invest in malls/retail real estate.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#28

Post by Nasrudith »

bsder wrote: post #12

How many of these are genuinely because the store couldn't make a profit vs got saddled by a bunch of private equity financial engineering debt? Guitar Center is a good example--if you sent them through a full blown Chapter 7 where they could finally discharge the stupid private equity debt they would be a perfectly profitable running business.

Aren't those two roughly equivalent by opportunity costs? One which is raking in money is too expensive if your goal is borderline debt dumping fraud when you can buy a mediocre stable business for those shenanigans.

Re: Mall department stores were struggling; the pandemic has pushed them to the edge

#30

Post by flubert »

flubert wrote: post #13

"Malls are dying" seems like a "the suit is back" sort of meme. I've literally been hearing this for 20+ years. And the mall near me seems busier than ever. Someone must be pushing this for some reason. People shorting mall real estate?

I wonder how this has worked out:

    A Hedge Fund Manager Who’s Shorting America’s Malls (2017)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14209161

...seems like 4 years is enough time to get a feel for things.

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