The Evolution Of Shopping Malls In America

Many things happened in 1956. Dwight D. Eisenhower was President Of The United States.  Elvis Presley got into the United States Music Charts for the first time with his hit, “Heartbreak Hotel,” In September, he made television history on the “Ed Sullivan Show.” Play-Doh was sold in Cincinnati, under a different name, as a cleaner for wallpaper. Someone noticed that children were playing with it, and its advertisement changed. The first enclosed and climate-controlled shopping mall introduced a new form of entertainment and convenient shopping.

The First Climate Controlled Shopping Mall

In Edina, Minnesota, a climate-controlled environment to shop in was a big deal. They loved the new Southdale Center and the mall is still in use today. Shopping malls started being built nation-wide after that. For many people, it was the first time they had ever experienced air-conditioning. Every mall had a theater, and some had more than one. Malls included art, fountains, statues, and gardens throughout the building. Malls became a destination, and on Friday nights, large crowds gathered.

Over The Years Shopping Malls Have Become Very Strategic In Their Design

Almost every mall has skylights. The over-head windows get built into a well to prevent glare on the store’s windows. When the sun starts to go down and the lighting changes, the lights inside that well come on so that no one will notice that it is getting darker and leave the mall because of it. Malls are all now built pretty much the same. When you enter a mall, there is a large store near you. There is also an elevator or escalator. As you walk through the mall’s bottom floor, you can always look up and see the stores above you. When you walk to the other end of the mall, there is another large store and another elevator or escalator. You can move to the other floor and walk back to where you started, nearest to the exit where you are parked. As you walk through a mall, the little stores are between the larger ones. As you walk past them, you will hopefully spend money. You will not find a grocery store, or any store selling perishable items at the mall. Perishables would cause you to be in a hurry to leave the mall. 

Things Are Changing

Young people still like to meet up with friends at the mall, but people can go home now to their own air-conditioned space, and movie theaters aren’t visited like they used to be. Technological growth around the world has changed the way people live in many ways. Shopping malls are experiencing a decline in traffic due to online shopping. From the comfort of your lazy-boy chair, you can now easily shop from home with no transportation needed. Online shopping is not a new idea anymore, and many people shop daily. There are grocery stores, pharmacies, and restaurants that will deliver whatever you buy directly to your home and very quickly. Online shopping can be less expensive, and because it is, many people prefer to shop from home. 


There are popular services online now called “cashback rebate websites” that offer shoppers even more reason to do their shopping online. If you want to shop online, you log into the site you use for rebates and click a link that goes to the place where you want to buy. The website that you shop from receives a commission every time a consumer clicks on their site in this way. When you are finished shopping, a rebate will get sent to your rewards account. Rebate websites are promotional incentives used by marketers. There are also mail-in-rebates available that work much the same way. Rather than going into an account, a check gets mailed to you. Mail-in rebates are one of the most popular ways to use rebate websites.

Shopping malls have faced concerns over the years about big stores that sell specific categories of merchandise. Through the years, They have managed to evolve and stay successful. Now they may be facing their biggest challenge ever, but possibly not. Many people still very much enjoy going to the mall.



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