For retailers, reopening means rethinking everything about a store

May 5, 2020
Precautions will likely start at the door as customers return to nonessential retailers. Shopping will be a different experience.
A reopened mall in Franklin, Tennessee, on May 2. Going shopping is likely to look quite different for awhile.
Brett Carlsen/Getty Images

The rising demand for Santas of color

Dec 23, 2019
Some events and businesses are trying to move away from typical portrayals of Santa.
Santa Larry Jefferson poses with a family.
Courtesy of Landon Luther, co-owner of The Santa Experience

Holiday shopping in full swing at one Montana mall

Dec 13, 2019
A mall with a twist is celebrating a promising holiday shopping season.
Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

When the mall "anchor" is a medical center

Sep 13, 2019
More shopping centers are turning to non-retail tenants.
A Forever 21 store in Chicago in 2014.
Timothy Hiatt/Getty Images for Forever 21

How turning retail space into office space could pay off in Butte, Montana

Apr 23, 2019
A call center is bringing new hope — and jobs — to a burdened mall.
Oli Scarff/Getty Images

Experiential shopping doesn't seem to be helping malls

Apr 16, 2019
A new study shows that adding experiential stores to malls doesn't seem to be increase customer foot traffic.
An ornate lighting fixture hangs in the lobby connecting a parking structure to the main area of the Americana at Brand shopping community in Glendale, California.
Shea Huffman/Marketplace

A Montana mall gets another chance

Jan 16, 2019
After years of watching department stores fall, a mall turns to the mixed-use concept.
“If there's one thing that retailers do, it's that we adapt," said Butte Plaza Mall manager Alana Ferko. “If you don't adapt, you'll go the way of the dinosaur."
Oli Scarff/Getty Images

For public good, not for profit.

Higher tariffs on consumer goods resonate at a Texas Walmart

Aug 2, 2018
On Wednesday, the Trump administration unveiled a proposal for even higher tariffs on many consumer goods imported from China. We went to a shopping center in Austin, Texas, to find out what buyers of those goods thought about the plan. Click the audio player above to hear the full story. 
A customer carries merchandise through a Walmart Supercenter.
Rick T. Wilking/Getty Images

A mall in Montana lost its department store ... again

Jul 30, 2018
When managing a shopping center, "every day is a fresh opportunity for creative problem solving."
People exit a subway into a Manhattan shopping mall on June 28, 2018 in New York City. The American economy showed the weakest performance in consumer spending in nearly five years new numbers from the Commerce Department show. Despite the drop in consumer spending, the gross domestic product (GDP) increased at a 2.0 percent annual rate in the January-March period to give a mixed picture on the state of the American economy.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images

As retailers shutter stores, mall operators fight back

Jan 3, 2018
This year could see thousands of additional store closures in malls across the country, according to a new study from commercial real estate company Cushman & Wakefield. That’s on top of some 9,000 store closings last year. Mall operators are trying a variety of options to secure their own future. Click the audio player above […]