rono3849 wrote:The Galleria is a a tipping point. It needs to downsize the retail aspect of the development and the retail industry continues to downsize. NorthPark is going to attract the boutique stores, while they will skip stores in The Galleria. The owners need to proceed with their plans to demo the South wing of the mall and replace it with a new hotel, new residential tower, and new office tower. The Gap/Banana Republic/Old Navy combo store can relocate to the old Marshall Field's location. American Girl store should be razed and replaced by an upscale movie theater. These moves can revitalize the mall in a smart way.
NorthPark is opening a Claires right as Galleria has opened up Intimissimi, Mango, and Cotopaxi, among others. Instead of filling vacant spaces with new tenants, a lot of them are just relocations of existing stores. They're not doing great either - instead of bringing back the very stores they kicked out when they wanted to upgrade the mall's image, proving that they failed to upgrade to a luxury mall, they need to add mixed use components to a property that currently has zero. Close down Maggianos and Corner Bakery and build a high rise luxury hotel or office tower on the site. Galleria has one too, but it’s not really the best use of space to open a store for a brand that sells its products everywhere from Walmart to CVS, and also planning to sell its products in the adjacent Macy’s. However, with the spaces surrounding the storefront all being empty at NorthPark and other big name tenants coming to the Galleria or West Village, I do think NorthPark is also feeling the effect of the retail struggles.
As for designer stores like Prada, Marni, and Creed, it's really all just due to proximity to Neiman Marcus (one that held pop ups for some of these brands) and proximity to the park cities.
Yes, the Kittenish store is in a small space, but it's among a bunch of other new-to-market locations that really could've been at NorthPark. If anything, I would say that the Galleria leasing team is doing a good job at making sure that the Galleria can thrive, even while Belk is closed and so is 1/3 of Nordstrom. Still, I do believe both malls are in desperate need of revitalization. It's not a good look for the Galleria to have 3 major vacancies, but let's not pretend like their leasing team hasn't pulled in some strong tenants within recent months.