New York
CNN
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Decades ago, Americans flocked to Main Street to shop. A string of small family-owned shops stood side by side along a tree-lined block or two, displaying their wares through large welcoming windows.
Then in 1956 something happened that changed the shopping experience forever. A new retail format infused the hustle and bustle of commerce on Main Street and recreated it inside a very large, boxy building that was—intentionally—windowless.
The birth of the American mall ushered in an era of windowless shopping that is largely still here. The strategy was smart and the little details in the planning — from the shoebox-free architecture to the potted plants – were carefully considered. These were spare measures for mall operators that were also designed to influence mall visitors to spend freely. The unnaturally bright artificial lighting attempted to create a permanent daytime environment. In this way, mall visitors would stay longer than expected and spend more than they would like.
Another reason for malls avoiding windows had to do with merchandising, Burt Flickinger, retail expert and managing director of retail consultancy Strategic Resource Group, told CNN.
Fewer windows and more walls, he said, meant more space for retailers to add shelves and bars to stock their products and maximize sales per square foot in their stores, which they would otherwise lose. from a dull view of the mall parking lot.
But the more insidious reason malls limit windows may be to make shoppers lose track of time.
“Shoppers can’t see the rainstorm or the snowstorm blowing in without windows. Windowless shopping creates a distraction-free consumption environment,” Flickinger said. “When people have a sense of timelessness and comfort, families spend more because they can focus solely on the stores and the mall experience.”
Shock and fear inside
The first fully enclosed mall—Southdale Center in Minneapolis—opened in 1956. It became the prototype going forward as climate-controlled indoor malls that could stay open year-round appeared in suburbs all over the place.
The architect of the 1.2 million square foot Southdale Center was Austrian-born Victor Gruen, considered a pioneer of modern shopping center design. He founded Gruen Associates, a legacy architecture, planning and landscape firm that still exists and is based in Los Angeles.
He wanted to dazzle shoppers with shock and awe as they enter the building and take in the well-lit shops and cafes, and even the artwork on display around the mall.
At the center of the mall’s plan would be a fountain or a glass roof, perhaps the only entry point of natural light entering the vast space. He added plants and music to create an engaging sensory experience.
The traditional mall structure was either T-shaped or cruciform with four anchor stores on either side, Stephanie Cegielski, vice president of research with the International Council of Shopping Centers, told CNN.
“When you’re walking around that ‘T’ everything is in front of you. As a buyer, you’re constantly looking at what’s coming next and you’re up against what’s happening in the outside world,” she said.
Because of all the activity he was dealing with, Cegielski said it didn’t make sense to have windows per se, “unless you were looking at a department store that has its own separate entrance to the mall that would create that window from the outside . ,” she said.
The exterior was a different story. The Southdale mall was functional and dim to look at and that is the plan that all traditional enclosed malls have continued to follow.
“Malls are really built to have the landscape inside. All the architectural energy we usually see on the outside of a building in an urban setting is focused inside. A shopping mall is a vending machine,” Alexandra Lange, an architecture critic and author of “Meet me by the fountain: An inside story of the mall,” said in an interview with CNN.
The first round of malls in the mid-to-late 1950s had more exterior architecture, Lange said. “But the mall owners found that there was no increase in consumer interest based on that, so let’s not waste money on that,” she said.
As an added bonus, “it was much less expensive for mall developers not to put in multiple windows facing the outside because it would make it cheaper to heat and cool the big box space,” Thomas McMillan said. director of the Center for Retail Studies at Texas A&M University’s Mays School of Business, in an interview with CNN.
Energy costs are typically the second highest operating expense for retailers after labor costs. “The sophistication of energy-efficient double-glazed windows was not ubiquitous when many shopping centers were built in America during and after the energy crisis of the 1970s. So conditioned air can penetrate through the window panes,” Flickinger said.
The design of the mall inspired a different type of store. Other shopping destinations that include a windowless location are supermarkets.
“A typical grocery store layout has all the fresh food around outside that tends to be refrigerated. It’s nice to have it near a wall where there’s power,” Lange said. “If you cut the windows into the wall, you have less space. for refrigerated boxes.”
Today, there are about 1,122 closed malls in the U.S., according to the International Council of Shopping Centers. That’s down from about 1,400 regional malls that existed about 15 years ago, according to Kristin Mueller, president of retail property management with JLL, a real estate and investment management services firm, in an interview with CNN .
But even with fewer enclosed malls existing today, and only a handful of new malls built over the past decade (including the 3 million-square-foot American Dream Mall that opened in East Rutherford, New Jersey in 2019) that still adhere to Gruen’s plan, buyers, especially Gen Z and Millennials, don’t seem to be disappointed by their windowless aesthetic, she said.
On average, 54% of US adult shoppers will visit a mall at least once a month in 2023 and spent an average of just over $300 each month last year, according to the latest data from ICSC. According to the group, 70% of those buyers were GenZers and 66% of them Millennials.
However, mall retail is developing, Cegielski said.
Families go to malls for entertainment as much as for shopping, with people enjoying restaurants, movies, mini golf, pickleball courts, and large indoor entertainment centers that have been renovated inside existing malls.
Some of these adaptive uses of traditional centers may create a practical need for windows after all, she said.