What Makes A Good Shopping Mall
A lot of our friends from overseas having noted one thing about us Malaysians - we take our shopping seriously. Just visit one of the major shopping malls during the weekend (or better yet, school holidays or festival time) and you will see what they mean.
There was some concern a year ago about oversupply of shopping retail space, with all the major malls undertaking major expansion works - 1 Utama (the new wing), MidValley (the Gardens) IOI Mall (new wing) and Sunway Pyramid (huge extension). Even the iconic Subang Parade underwent a major refurbishment. Then there are also hypermarkets slowly chipping into the market with their trendy new outlets resembling malls by themselves.
Currently, things have sort of stabilized, the only major mall we can think of opening soon is Giza in Sunway Damansara.
Shopping malls and residential properties form a complicated and symbiotic relationship. To look at it simply, a successful shopping mall will increase the property image and prices of homes in the vicinity. But too close and the neighbourhood suffers from the associated problems - indiscrimate parking, traffic jams, noise and light pollution. A good example is Bandar Utama and 1 Utama. In the early days of the township, there was rampant parking problems all over the surrounding homes because of the insufficient bays in the mall. In addition to that, the long line of cars entering the mall caused unending traffic chaos at peak hours (due to the pay-when-you-enter system). This problem was arrested when the management opened up the open air parking and changed to the autopay system.
But developers looking to build a successful mall have problems of their own. With the rising affluency of Malaysian shoppers and their inevitable increasing expectations, it takes more planning and market study to plan and build a successful mall (not to mention more money). The one thing that draws crowds at the moment is a successful concept. Like a garden theme (Mid-Valley Gardens), or target the various lucrative niche markets (like Sunway Pyramid). Having the right mix of tenants and facilities is important too, that goes without saying.
If you don’t have enough land or money to go toe to toe with the big boys, focus on the niche market and do it well. One good example of this is Great Eastern Mall in Jalan Ampang. Its mostly unspectacular by comparison, but fishing in the lucrative expat market is their key to success.
But having said that, another important element in the long term success (or survival, for that matter) is the keeping up with the changing times and trends, reinventing and rebranding whenever necessary.
example of malls not doing well: amcorp mall, ampang park, pertama complex, maju junction…..
Comment by govin — July 10, 2009 @ 10:23 pm
as far i know amcorp mall business as usual. they are still ok.
as for ampang park, they took over city square. that side not doing well & the buiding no more there.
Comment by a — July 11, 2009 @ 2:49 pm
summit in subang jaya also doing badly
Comment by sktan — July 11, 2009 @ 8:31 pm
At the other end of the stick we have white elephants like phoenix plaza and uncang emas (ue), both in cheras.
Comment by lampard — July 13, 2009 @ 9:50 am
Wangsa Maju, Jaya Jusco, Carrefour & new one openning soon opposite of Carrefour.
Comment by Alan — July 17, 2009 @ 12:12 am
It will be interesting to see how the new Tropicana Mall perform.
Comment by shchoy — July 19, 2009 @ 10:20 pm