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Are Enclosed Malls Dying?

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#151 rriojas71

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Posted 29 December 2022 - 12:37 PM

On my way back from the very, very busy Westworth Village area last night, going south on Alta Mere Drive, I glanced at what used to be a bustling Ridgmar Mall.  Dark and mostly vacant.  How sad!  I remember how wonderful it was to dine at the El Fenix restaurant there around Christmastime.  As went Carswell AFB and the Strategic Air Command by the end of the 1980s, so went, eventually, Ridgmar Mall.

You know the one interesting thing that I noticed as I drove around the Ridgmar Property recently is that the strip center where Woody Creek BBQ is located was completely full of tenants.  There was not an empty space.  I found that very odd with the fact that the rest of the retail was on life support.



#152 Nitixope

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Posted 29 December 2022 - 01:03 PM

My guess is whoever owns this strip mall probably offered their tenants reasonable rent and reasonable terms on their leases. I know a lady who owns a similar type of property and most of her tenants have been there for years. Look at the places in this mall you mentioned: Merle Norman, a mums place, Fish place, sewing world etc. pretty unique destinations.

https://goo.gl/maps/dZnfn7cbaYYmmqad6

#153 rriojas71

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Posted 29 December 2022 - 01:12 PM

My guess is who ever owns this strip mall probably offered their tenants reasonable rent and reasonable terms on their leases. I know a lady who owns a similar type of property and most of her tenants have been there for years. Look at the places in this mall you mentioned: Merle Norman, a mums place, Fish place, sewing world etc. pretty unique destinations.

https://goo.gl/maps/dZnfn7cbaYYmmqad6

My only assumption is what you stated about reasonable rental rates and terms.  It may also be very well managed because it is not run down or unkempt at all.



#154 Dismuke

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Posted 09 January 2023 - 11:07 PM

Here is my thought as to what would be wise for the owner of Ridgmar Mall to do:
 

Demolish the former Neiman Marcus store building.

 

Carve out about a 150,000 or so sq ft plot immediately to the east and south of the movie theater.  This would take up about the southern third of the former Neiman's site.

Approach H-E-B and tell them that they can have a long-term $0 lease on that plot of land so long as they expeditiously erect and continue to operate one of their H-E-B  Plus stores on the site.

 

Agree that, however the rest of the mall site is eventually redeveloped, there will remain a sufficient number of parking spaces for both the HEB and whatever new uses may come along.

 

That will draw traffic to the site and in a big way.  Yes, HEB is starting to locate in suburban portions of the county where there is land to build.  But finding a location of suitable size within the central part of the city is much more difficult and expensive.  Who knows when such a store might otherwise be built - and here is a plot of land, certainly large enough, that is a reasonably close drive to most areas west of downtown. And it would enable them to offer home delivery service to the central portion of Fort Worth that much faster. 

 

The store would be immediately successful - as HEB stores always are.  But it would be especially successful in Fort Worth - a much needed and welcome alternative to the mediocre (at best) stores and mind-bogglingly high prices of Albertsons/Tom Thumb on one hand and all of the various things that can sometimes make shopping at Walmart a less-than-pleasant hassle.  And people in Fort Worth would no longer have to listen to transplants from Austin/San Antonio/Houston invariably ask: "why are the grocery stores in D/FW so crappy?"

HEB is careful about where they put their stores - so perhaps there is something demographically about the location that they would consider a negative that I am not aware of.  But since Albertsons, Aldi and Walmart are nearby and that particular Albertsons has managed to somehow survive the chain's massive downsizing in the area, I am guessing it would be a suitable location - and I would think a free ground lease would sweeten the deal.

As for the owners of Ridgmar - the traffic the store would generate would open the door to all sorts of possibilities.  HEB is the one retailer whose stores are usually very busy - and one that people will drive an extra distance to shop at.  I doubt it will be able to save the mall itself.  But it might enable Penny's and businesses that rent space in the mall to remain viable until other, better uses for the site are found.
 


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#155 Dismuke

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 01:20 AM

I agree with you Johnfwd.  I think Ridgmar is too far gone, and Brookfield, JCPenney, and Ridgmar's owners should work out a deal to relocate JCPenney into the old Sears space at Hulen.  This will keep JCPenney in Fort Worth proper, and fill a vacancy at Hulen Mall, and then seal the deal for total redevelopment at Ridgmar. 

 

Considering that JC Penny has been through a near-death experience and on life support and the company has not hesitated to shed locations - there has to be some monetary reason why the location at Ridgmar has continued to remain open, however inexplicable it might seem.

 

I haven't been in that store in several years so I have no idea of what sort of customers that location has in terms of demographics.  But I have a theory:

 

There are people over a certain age who continue to remain suspicious of online shopping.  The notion of not buying something in person and looking at if first feels completely foreign to them despite the fact that their own children and grandchildren do it all the time.

 

Various Westside neighborhoods have lots of people in this age bracket who have lived in those neighborhoods for decades and who are reasonably affluent.  Back in the day, when such people needed something beyond what they could get in grocery store or the drug store their first impulse was to go to Ridgmar Mall.  That's what everybody did.  

 

These are people who, once they reached a certain age, never kept up with trends and aren't particularly adventurous and sometimes even downright reluctant in terms of trying new things that might come along.  They would prefer to shop at Tom Thumb instead of Central Market because so much that is sold at Central Market is unfamiliar to them - weird stuff that their kids and grandkids are into. Besides, years ago, Tom Thumb was the nicest store in town and that perception persists for them.  Even when they were younger, they were not particularly inclined to drive to stores on the other side of town to go shopping.  They were affluent enough that they didn't feel the necessity of driving around to chase bargains and their preferences were conventional enough that they were perfectly satisfied with whatever selection at nearby Ridgmar was offered to them.  Now that they are elderly, they are even less inclined to drive across town.

Fast forward decades into the future to several years back and, in their mind, when they needed to buy something beyond what they could get a the grocery or drug store, their fist impulse was still to go to Ridgmar Mall even though the rest of the world was rapidly moving on to more diverse and convenient options. But, suddenly, the stores they had always gone to in Ridgmar started closing - Neimans and then Macys.  But they continued to shop at Ridgmar - just as they continued, without complaint, to pay to have a paper copy of the Star-Telegram delivered to their door despite the fact that its page count is a sad shadow of what it once was and the price for a paper copy has necessarily skyrocketed and that it makes much more sense financially and in terms of timeliness to subscribe to the online version.. 

 

These are people who have spent their entire lives perfectly content with the nearby options that were offered to them - and since, back in the day, they had a decent range of options to choose from, they never questioned those options. Thinking outside of the box to explore other options wasn't something likely to occur to them.  And when those nearby options started shrinking, out of habit they continued to select from the options that remained until there were none left and they were forced to look elsewhere. 

I am guessing that, before it closed, such people constituted a sizeable core of what was left of the Ridgmar Sears customer base.  When Sears closed they no longer could reflexively go there if they needed a new lawn mower or power tool.  But there is a Lowes down the street which isn't that much further to drive to.  And, given they were more or less forced to give shopping there a try a few times, they probably now see its advantages and would not be inclined to go back to Sears if it somehow miraculously opened back up. But if Sears had not closed, they would still be going to Sears.

 

But, when it comes to items such as clothing, bedding, kitchenware, etc., to the degree that they were previously getting such stuff from Sears instead of Penny's, they reflexively turn to Penny's.  Where else, without driving across town, are they going to get such things?  And these are people who are from a time where the perception was that things purchased from a Kmart/Walmart/Target were probably of inferior quality. So, while they might sometimes shop at such stores for stuff like cleaning supplies, they are going to be more comfortable about buying other things at a place such as Penny's or Sears, if it still existed.

 

My GUESS is that it has been people similar to my above caricature who have kept the Ridgmar Penny's going - their long-time customer base plus those they inherited from Sears..  If they move the store to Hulen - many such people are not going to be inclined to drive across town and deal with the nasty Hulen area traffic.  Maybe they will switch to the nearby Walmart or Target and, once they get used to them, be perfectly satisfied - or maybe that will be the final straw that finally pushes them into giving online shopping a try..  

Meanwhile, I suspect the demographics around Hulen Mall is somewhat different.  If they don't have a similar nearby crowd that reflexively goes to Hulen Mall, they will miss out on that segment of the market.  And to the degree the demographics around Hulen mall are younger - I have read that younger people tend to perceive JC Penny as being frumpy and are not particularly inclined to go there.  So it might actually be more profitable, at least  in the short term, to remain by itself at Ridgmar with only the Dillard's outlet as competition.  And I don't think the Dillard's outlet is much competition for it. I have gotten some great buys there - but one usually has to put in a lot of effort digging through an enormous amount of wrong sizes and stuff one isn't at all interested in to find them. To the degree getting a really great price is not that much of a factor, then it doesn't make much sense going there. 

Just a guess.  But, to the degree my guess is accurate, then the JC Penny at Ridgmar is just riding off of dwindling momentum and customer inertia and is very much living on borrowed time.  So it will be interesting to see what lasts the longest  - JC Penny at Ridgmar or the print edition of the Star-Telegram.


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#156 Dismuke

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 01:52 AM

Speaking of Sears and the decline of retail, the following from another website is all that is left of Sears and of Kmart (which Sears purchased some years back and, along with itself, ran into the ground)
 

Sears - 18 total: 17 in the 50 states (12 full-line, 2 Home & Life, 3 Appliance & Mattress), and 1 full-line store in Puerto Rico.
 
Kmart - 8 total: 3 stores in the 50 States (Miami FL, Westwood NJ, and Bridgehampton NY), 1 in Guam, and 4 in the US Virgin Islands
 
 
Those numbers are as of December 31, 2022.  One of those 18 Sears stores will be closing this month bringing the total down to 17 total, 16 in the 50 states.
 
My guess is a decent percentage of people from North Texas aren't even aware that a tiny handful are still open.  And, of the stores that are still open, I have read that large portions of them are empty. The question a lot of people are asking is: why even bother to keep a such a small number of stores open?  
 
In 1994 Kmart had 2,486 stores.  At its height Sears had 3,500 stores.  I stopped shopping at both well before they pulled out of D/FW.  But I will be sad when I read that the last ones close.  Back in the 1890s and in the first couple decades of the 20th century, Sears was the Amazon of its day.  And Kmart was an innovative evolution of the old S.S. Kresge dime store chain which dated back to 1899.   It is sad when a business that has managed to endure that long and achieved such heights of success, just goes away.

 

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#157 steave

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 04:30 AM

This is a weird thought, but I think the actual vintage 1970s/1980s mall buildings themselves will survive the longest at places like Ridgmar which could hypothetically leave them for adaptive reuse someday 50 years from now. Like Montgomery Plaza or T&P station.

 

Aside for a few charismatic shopping destinations that need to make the most of a piece of land and where the enclosed concept still is optimal(malls like Northpark, Westfield centers in LA, etc), I imagine malls owned by companies like Simon located in states like New Jersey or California will mostly all get torn down in the near future precisely because they are still successful. They can be profitably redeveloped into some kind of outdoor or more modern shopping center. Look at Memorial City in Houston, which dates to 1959. It's almost entirely full and always busy, and the owners announced a long term process of demolishing one piece at a time to replace with an open air shopping center. Obviously as a business they wouldn't be doing this unless they thought they could attract higher rents doing that.

 

Ridgmar is IIRC owned by some small investor group that also owns malls in Tyler or something like that? It would probably be expensive to tear it down. And there isn't a clear vision for what they could do with that land, it's in an awkward location. As long as there is nothing horribly wrong with the building (suppose it was hit by a tornado, a real possibility) I'd think they would just keep it open indefinitely as long as they can fill spaces with whatever as long as they pay the rent. Day cares, government offices, self storage facility, delivery service pickup spot, gym, who knows??

 

I'm curious how the Red Bird project in Dallas goes. They've succeeded in replacing all the anchor's except the Macy's (which has the cool architecture and mosaic) with other uses. It has an updated retail component (a nice foot locker store), and they want to keep the interior main court for small businesses to occupy still.



#158 eastfwther

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 07:28 AM

 Look at Memorial City in Houston, which dates to 1959. It's almost entirely full and always busy, and the owners announced a long term process of demolishing one piece at a time to replace with an open air shopping center. Obviously as a business they wouldn't be doing this unless they thought they could attract higher rents doing that.

 

 

It's funny you mentioned Memorial City in Houston.  I go to Houston often and what the owners have done with Memorial City doesn't get the accolades it deserves. That place was drying up years ago, but attaching the hospital, hotel and outdoor retail was genius. And of course now, there's office, Hotel Zaza,  more retail and now residential components have come online.  I think something similar could happen at Ridgmar...maybe one day. 



#159 Crestline

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 07:42 AM

I will contribute a weird thought too: the ring-road-interior of Ridgmar Mall is one-quarter the entire buildable land of Panther Island!

 

tfJPAcs.png

 

(from MAPfrappe)

 

Seriously just bulldoze the whole thing and redevelop it with a modern site plan. :cheez:



#160 Nitixope

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 08:58 AM

I think it was mentioned in conversation or above, but in just 3 more years, Ridgmar Mall will be 50-years old and could qualify as an historic building.



#161 John T Roberts

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 09:47 AM

Yes, in 3 years, Ridgmar Mall would meet the first criteria for a historic building.  With the condition of the mall as it is now, and considering that it is not architecturally significant, I doubt that it would be nominated for a designation.  Individual designation for private property has to come from the property owner.  Personally, I would rather see Hulen Mall receive historic designation because it is more architecturally significant.  If the mall was not designated, I would settle for a local designation (minimum) of the Sanger-Harris/Foley's/Macy*s store, due to the fact that it is the only store with the murals fully intact on the building that is still open within the State of Texas.  One store in Tulsa is still open with only one of the murals visible.



#162 Dismuke

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 03:54 PM

This is a weird thought, but I think the actual vintage 1970s/1980s mall buildings themselves will survive the longest at places like Ridgmar which could hypothetically leave them for adaptive reuse someday 50 years from now. Like Montgomery Plaza or T&P station.

 

 

 

With a span of 50 years, perhaps enclosed shopping malls might even make a comeback.  Some of the very early enclosed malls (Seminary South here in Fort Worth was an example) actually started out as outdoor centers and were converted when indoor malls became the thing.  Who at the time would have ever thought that, someday, people would be converting indoor malls into outdoor centers?  Who, at the time, would have ever thought that downtowns and inner city neighborhoods would make a comeback and become trendy places for the affluent?

And nobody can predict what retail will be like 50 years from now.  If virtual reality/augmented reality ever becomes feasible and widespread, that would, undoubtedly, change how people shop. If, let's say, nuclear fusion ever becomes viable and lives up to claims that it will provide unlimited, super cheap electricity, perhaps the cost of heating or air conditioning large stores and indoor centers will become negligible.  Perhaps manufacturers or retailers will set up huge spectacular show rooms with minimal staff and no inventory where people can look at, touch and feel various products and, if they wish to order, they just scan the item into whatever ends up replacing smartphones and it is immediately shipped to them.

I have a hard time imagining that demand for brick and mortar purchases will go away entirely.  There are some things people need NOW, not in a day or even a few hours, in order to get something done without delay.  And some things just don't scale well for online retail - for example, second hand items, one of a kind handcrafted items, perishables such as produce where visual inspection is important. 

 

The problem is that it is becoming increasingly difficult to find certain things one needs at brick and mortar stores.  Online has drained away the volume that they once depended on - so to reduce costs they are minimizing both their on-hand inventory and eliminating slow-moving items from their shelves. 

 

For years I have had staff at Home Depot and Lowes refer me to tiny mom-and-pop hardware stores for certain types of items needed for repairs in a home built in the 1920s.  But I doubt that such hardware stores could survive in a brick and mortar fashion by only selling such slow moving, specialized items.  But, at the same time, their lack of scale make it hard for them to be price competitive on high demand items.  So such items become increasingly available on an online-only basis. 

It has occurred to me that, down the road, indoor malls might become viable by using a model similar to that of so-called antique malls.  The way antique malls work is the various antique merchants rent one or more booths for displaying their merchandise.  The merchandise has paper tags indicating which merchant's booth it came from.  The entire building has a centralized checkout where shoppers can pay for multiple items from multiple merchants in a single transaction.   And, in addition to being able to generate traffic by the draw of greater variety, the merchant does not need to staff the booth.  They can operate booths in multiple antique malls and can use their time for other things, including earning money in a "day job."

To apply the antique mall concept to a conventional mall, different highly specialized merchants would rent shop space in the mall.  The individual shops would not necessarily need to be staffed unless having somebody knowledgeable on hand to answer shopper questions would increase sales enough to make it profitable.  The individual shops would not have their own checkouts.  Instead, shoppers would go from store to store and select whatever they might need.  And, unlike an antique mall, there would be no physical checkout lines.  All items in the various shops would be tagged with some form of RFID tag or similar technology that would track what each customer selected and from which merchant it came.  This tag would communicate with the mall's computers as the items are selected and charge the customer's electronic payment method once they leave the building.  The system would automatically allocate the funds for each merchant's share of the transaction as well as the fee the mall charges to provide the service.  Staffing requirements on the mall's part would primarily be security and janitorial - and in the future, a lot of that is likely to be automated. 

Such merchants would be able to carry a much wider and specialized assortment of items than would be feasible for mass merchandisers such as Target or Walmart.  It would not only enable people to be able to pick up NOW specialized items one might typically have to buy online, it might even be more economical than online shopping.  Some items are not economical to ship on an individual basis - either they are an odd size, too heavy, or the cost of the item is so low that the cost of shipping exceeds the value of the item.  Ordering a can of green beans on Amazon will never be less expensive than buying it in a local store, unless, perhaps one orders an entire case, which one might have no need for.  So such a mall might make it possible to bring the "long tail" benefits of online shopping to the brick and mortar world - something that mass merchandisers are not set up for in terms of specialized expertise.

And, if such a concept of unstaffed, highly specialized stores were to come about, a mall format would be perfect.  One could spread the fixed costs of the security and checkout systems across a larger number of merchants.  And, for consumers, if an enticing enough collection of merchants were put together under a single roof, it would offer similar "one stop shopping" benefits as mass merchandisers such as Walmart.

This isn't any sort of prediction on my part - just my imagination extending current trends into the future.  But, let's just say that if indoor shopping malls ever make a big time comeback - well, stranger things have happened. 


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#163 elpingüino

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 07:31 PM

Even relatively new malls are struggling, like Shops at Willow Bend, built in 2001. https://www.dallasne...ring-new-plans/

#164 John T Roberts

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Posted 10 January 2023 - 09:21 PM

The Shops at Willow Bend was struggling when it opened.







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