In the US, did Amazon kill the mall, is everyone too broke, or a combination of other factors?

Etterra , 6 days ago

Yes, yes, and yes.

probableprotogen , 6 days ago

One of the big problems is horrible city planning since the malls were just built anywhere they could be crammed into. Combine that with a very car-centeric country and you get very little reason to go out to the mall with the advent of the internet.

Rolder , 6 days ago

For me personally, I’m fuckin lazy and the ability to have things delivered right to my door enables this laziness.

rem26_art , 6 days ago (edited 6 days ago)

This is anecdotal to me, but I remember going to the mall a whole lot as a kid cuz my mom liked shopping at the stores there. Nowadays, she still shops at the same stores, but usually through their own websites. For me, when I learned how to drive and could go to the mall myself, it was probably only to go to a place like Gamestop, since the one in the mall was the closest to me. Again, online shopping, and especially being able to download games through like, Xbox Live, the eShop (and Steam, but I wasn't really into PC gaming until much more recently) was much more convenient than having to drive 20-30 minutes to the mall.

EDIT: Another thing I remembered is that a Target opened up closer to where I lived, so it just became more convenient to shop there for stuff like cheap clothes vs brand name places like H&M. They also sold stuff you couldn't buy at the mall like groceries, so it was more enticing, i guess.

Recently I went back to the mall I grew up around and it was a lot more empty. One of the really big stores that was there when I was a kid was Sears and they're gone now, and that mall had a TON of space dedicated to Sears. No one has come to lease that space. The mall has a sprawling parking lot that's mostly empty now.

I remember as a kid there were always like, crazy extravagant displays at the mall around the Holiday Season, and things like raffles where you could win a new car or something, but I don't think any of that has happened there in recent years to nearly the same scale.

I wouldn't say this mall is completely dead yet (I visited a different mall that had like, maybe 5 stores open and a lot of converted office space in it on a Saturday afternoon and that was eerie and dead while still being open to the public), but I think its on its way out.

SpeedLimit55 , 6 days ago

I only go to the mall for Dicks sporting goods or Apple which both have their own entrances. Have not walked inside the mall or any other stores in years.

Maeve , 6 days ago

In addition to the other replies, items there were just too expensive. Now, items are too expensive without the mall, and it's not to do with regular/mid-low level management, supply chain costs, but due to price gouging, in order to pay executive, board, and and other major share holders/investors. (See the Economic Policy Institute reports on this, for more info).

sunzu , 6 days ago

Urban malls seem to be doing mostly fine. Its mostly suburban once that are flopping. Selection is trash

davel , 6 days ago

The rise of the suburban mall and its downward spiral are pre-Amazon, and largely had to do with tax decisions and costs to the public sector, though online shopping did accelerate the collapse. Slate, 2017: The Retail Apocalypse Is Suburban

BearOfaTime , 6 days ago

The mall was dying by the 80’s, there was a sharp decline by then (I recall seeing numerous malls going vacant in the 90’s, around the country).

The things that drove mall popularity (especially things like large, enclosed, air-conditioned space), were no longer novel. Most cars were air-conditioned by then.

I’m sure there are many other factors, like the growth of free-standing single-vendor buildings (so construction and management costs must’ve changed).

Amazon really had nothing to do with it.

Riccosuave , 6 days ago

Conventional brick and mortar retail is extremely expensive to maintain. It has less to do with Amazon specifically, and more to do with the rise of online retail & direct to consumer business models more generally. Don’t get me wrong, Amazon was a huge pioneer in that area, but it would have happened one way or another.