Here's my funny Mall story: sitting in the Food Court with friends, discussing famous movie quotes, I happened to observe a woman carefully choosing an apple from a juice bar kiosk. She was picking each one up and almost massaging them. Finally, I'd seen enough and I walk over and I say, nicely, "You know, Mam, other people may buy those apples after you've touched them all." She just looked at me, put the apple down and walked away. I returned to my table and what do you know? Five minutes later she returns, and picks up another apple. My friends and I had been continuing our conversation about famous movie quotes, so feeling inspired, I walk over to the woman and say, "You want apples?" She said, "I think I'm entitled!" I said, "You want APPLES??! She said, "I want the FRUIT!!" And I said, loudly, "YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE FRUIT!"
There is joy when someone gets an arcane joke :) I am also relieved, assuming it was not a Granny Smith or Golden Delicious, that you did not call for a Code Red
"Do you have any horse or dog or cat?" I asked hopefully.” LOL!!
"So they're not harvesting them off a dead squirrel?" SUPER DUPER LOL!!!
"Oh no!" he replied. "Is it a mall?" Anne, you should have texted Aharon b4 chossing this topic.
“It was slowly sinking in: The only thing weird at the mall was me, walking around like a dumb-ass, expecting a mall to be weird.” OMG!!! A FUNNY MOMENT OF SELF-REALIZATION!!
“…the Oculus in Lower Manhattan, resembles a giant bleached turkey carcass.” Lol!!
THE SENTENCE I DISAGREE WITH THE MOST:
“I imagine, however, that as the years go by, the American Dream mall will get far more interesting in ways that no one currently is planning.”
Malls have seen their day…I know because I live in the home of the original Mall developers: Edward J. DeBartolo, Sr., and Anthony Cafaro. You can’t spit around here without hitting a decaying mall. Anne, those days are long gone, as evinced by your exploration.
Hmmm. Maybe the janitors were actually Harry Potters professors? Another missed opportunity!
And you're right about Aharon.
It is very interesting to me that malls have been dying for a decade now and there are for sure a lot of weird dead malls but developers keep opening new ones. I don't think the developers are stupid. I think as American shoppers, we like to think we don't go to the mall anymore because we are too sophisticated but we actually DO. Just don't call it a mall!
Needing to go to the mall occasionally is a fact of life, even if it's no longer the joy it once was. Bring back Contempo Casuals and Orange Julius. Don't need 'sportsing', with slopes and wave pools.
My wife likes to visit the mall...like I said from our house you can spit and hit it. I kind of stopped brick and mortar shopping when the Downtown closed up. Shopping there felt like being in NYC during Christmas! Heck, no one even knows what a "mezzanine" is anymore (I nervously purchased my 1st Playboy magazine at the book department of Strouss-Hirshberg, on the mezzanine, at age 17. It featured the girls from the old Price Is Right Show! LOL!!) https://hpb.com/products/playboy-magazine-may-1971-vol-18-no-5-6751d530-e986-459d-9011-77ca4170f1da
Shopping online is heaven-sent for this old dude. I think women are more tactile and feel a need to try things on. Women want to look nice.
When I learned of this mall, the first thing that came to mind was its incompatibility with the times. An air-conditioned monstrosity with 33,000 parking spaces!? But OK, this is America. And also, despite just opening, it was conceived in the early 2000s, which may as well have been a hundred years ago. "The American Dream mall will get far more interesting in ways that no one currently is planning" is a great perspective. I reckon it'll get interesting as a sort of relic of misguided progress.
Thanks Christian & Anne -- my favorite part of the thread -- I hope the Jets and Giants are satisfied now. I would imagine football owners don't understand why anyone would build stuff anyhow -- get the taxpayers to pay for it instead!
The strangest part to me is that it's in Bergen County which still maintains Blue Laws. No shopping on Sunday! One of the strange but enjoyable quirks about Bergen County. I'm also pumped that they recently opened a H-Mart in the mall. Because, why not?!
Love this article and your honesty. Also, lesson for a planner: what makes the world most interesting is the things that we couldn’t or wouldn’t have planned.
Hah! I love this piece. And I know that feeling well of earnestly wanting to be awed and not being able to find anything awesome. Favorite line of many favorite lines: "The place felt like heaven might feel if you were the only person on earth who’d been good." Finally: I want the Oreo Shake! Yum!!
Malls are so weird! And I say this as a child of the 90s who met her friends “at the mall”. Just the concept of stuffing a bunch of stores together along with an amusent park and a food court! And no windows. Still, I loved your line about about how YOU were the weirdest attraction there. Haha
Jillian I tried to think of what American Dream resembled and the best I could come up with is that if we had to colonize a planet where you couldn't go outside because the air was poisonous and EVERYTHING had to be inside, we might build something like the American Dream mall. But the funny thing is, you CAN breathe the air on planet Earth, but they still built the American Dream mall. Why?
I watched a short video recently in a class I am taking. Had a funny bit of dialog. Why are we thinking about building an indoor Earth on Mars while we are likely ruining the planet and making Earth more like Mars?
For the old-timers: I always like to know if they think the world's truly crazier now, or if every generation just thinks they're living through "unprecedented" times.
LOL Yes. Especially the "Deep Fried Love" kiosk in the third floor food court where you can enjoy fried mac-and-cheese bites and corn dogs followed by fried cheesecake.
I think ALL malls are weird -- being the epitome of artificiality 😅. And you inspired some research: As a fierce animal lover, I'm asking myself: Kangaroo and ostrich jerky -- they import the creatures from Australia? Who exports them? And as always: thank you for introducing me to strange and fascinating places, without having to go myself 😉.
Thank you Jessica! And you are right, ALL malls are weird, in their mall-ness. I'm almost rooting for them now that they have become sort of the retail underdog.
Don't you wonder how a mall like this manages to stay in business? While the primary focus is real estate, the underlying shops have little to offer and eventually cycle out because they can't make rent. Seriously, the Oreo store? Are there that many fans willing to buy Oreo merchandise?
I prefer to think of them as fronts, seedy underworld businesses that are laundering cash... because it's more interesting than a guy who loved beef jerky enough to start a beef jerky outlet. If I ever see a paper store in one of these malls I'm calling those shenanigans.
Haha, I mean like a store that literally just sells white paper... even better a store that just sells paperclips, where your first thought is this has to be a front 🤣
If the mall can get large enough they could put the paperclip and paper stores next door :) -- SNL is just like big malls -- constantly reinventing -- at times the cynics think it will die -- kinda like an organism which figures out how to adapt
Many property management companies have the tenants pay for most to all operating expenses, while the charged rent goes to paying off the construction loans. They can stay in business because as long as enough tenants keep coming, they have enough cash flow to pay off their loans and pay for the mall's running costs.
As an Aussie (Australian), I’m learning a lot about America from your posts. I was born in Sydney and remember when we all flocked to ‘Roselands’ when it opened in 1965. Traffic jams as everyone tried to check out this new experience. So amusing to see that it currently only has 3187 parking spaces. It seemed enormous to me at the time. Thanks for all the fun reads. A very different world.
Beth, your comment lead me to Google "World's Largest Parking Lot" and the Guiness World Record goes to Canada's West Edmonton Mall, with 20k spaces. I guess they have not heard about the American Dream Parking Miracle!
What I think is more interesting though is that you have to pay to park after the first 30 minutes. That just seems CRAZY to me!
Very nourishing and healthy. Good for your gut microbes which, according to health experts, help everything including your mood. Those little anchorites walled up in the Cathedral of St. Bowel the Irritable!
"walking around like a dumbass"! DYING! So dang funny. And I love that Cats subscribed! He won't regret it. xo
Thanks Courtney. I think that was my favorite part of the day too, when I realized what a dumbass I was.
Here's my funny Mall story: sitting in the Food Court with friends, discussing famous movie quotes, I happened to observe a woman carefully choosing an apple from a juice bar kiosk. She was picking each one up and almost massaging them. Finally, I'd seen enough and I walk over and I say, nicely, "You know, Mam, other people may buy those apples after you've touched them all." She just looked at me, put the apple down and walked away. I returned to my table and what do you know? Five minutes later she returns, and picks up another apple. My friends and I had been continuing our conversation about famous movie quotes, so feeling inspired, I walk over to the woman and say, "You want apples?" She said, "I think I'm entitled!" I said, "You want APPLES??! She said, "I want the FRUIT!!" And I said, loudly, "YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE FRUIT!"
https://youtu.be/PWSx0bBiNIs
I wish you could have reported her reply was: What we have here is a failure to communicate Mr. Meddler.
😂😂😂😂😂😂
There is joy when someone gets an arcane joke :) I am also relieved, assuming it was not a Granny Smith or Golden Delicious, that you did not call for a Code Red
Simply magnificent!!!! Hahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
CRACKING UP!! But no! You are a delight! xo
“…and, of course, the one and only Cats! Thank you!!” OMG! Cats is a fellow traveler!!!
THE FUNNIEST SENTENCES IN THE NEWSLETTER:
“You may ask yourself: if one of NYC’s richest billionaires can support CAFÉ ANNE, why can’t I?” LOL!!
“The place felt like heaven might feel if you were the only person on earth who’d been good.” LOL!!
https://youtu.be/AotwVWhkMKs
"Do you have any horse or dog or cat?" I asked hopefully.” LOL!!
"So they're not harvesting them off a dead squirrel?" SUPER DUPER LOL!!!
"Oh no!" he replied. "Is it a mall?" Anne, you should have texted Aharon b4 chossing this topic.
“It was slowly sinking in: The only thing weird at the mall was me, walking around like a dumb-ass, expecting a mall to be weird.” OMG!!! A FUNNY MOMENT OF SELF-REALIZATION!!
“…the Oculus in Lower Manhattan, resembles a giant bleached turkey carcass.” Lol!!
THE SENTENCE I DISAGREE WITH THE MOST:
“I imagine, however, that as the years go by, the American Dream mall will get far more interesting in ways that no one currently is planning.”
Malls have seen their day…I know because I live in the home of the original Mall developers: Edward J. DeBartolo, Sr., and Anthony Cafaro. You can’t spit around here without hitting a decaying mall. Anne, those days are long gone, as evinced by your exploration.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_J._DeBartolo_Sr.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cafaro_Company
JRB!
Hmmm. Maybe the janitors were actually Harry Potters professors? Another missed opportunity!
And you're right about Aharon.
It is very interesting to me that malls have been dying for a decade now and there are for sure a lot of weird dead malls but developers keep opening new ones. I don't think the developers are stupid. I think as American shoppers, we like to think we don't go to the mall anymore because we are too sophisticated but we actually DO. Just don't call it a mall!
Needing to go to the mall occasionally is a fact of life, even if it's no longer the joy it once was. Bring back Contempo Casuals and Orange Julius. Don't need 'sportsing', with slopes and wave pools.
My wife likes to visit the mall...like I said from our house you can spit and hit it. I kind of stopped brick and mortar shopping when the Downtown closed up. Shopping there felt like being in NYC during Christmas! Heck, no one even knows what a "mezzanine" is anymore (I nervously purchased my 1st Playboy magazine at the book department of Strouss-Hirshberg, on the mezzanine, at age 17. It featured the girls from the old Price Is Right Show! LOL!!) https://hpb.com/products/playboy-magazine-may-1971-vol-18-no-5-6751d530-e986-459d-9011-77ca4170f1da
Shopping online is heaven-sent for this old dude. I think women are more tactile and feel a need to try things on. Women want to look nice.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strouss
Agree, to all above!
When I learned of this mall, the first thing that came to mind was its incompatibility with the times. An air-conditioned monstrosity with 33,000 parking spaces!? But OK, this is America. And also, despite just opening, it was conceived in the early 2000s, which may as well have been a hundred years ago. "The American Dream mall will get far more interesting in ways that no one currently is planning" is a great perspective. I reckon it'll get interesting as a sort of relic of misguided progress.
"OK, this is America." Haha, exactly! This is what we do. :)
I love the idea of American Dream as a relic of misguided progress.
BTW learned yesterday after publishing the post the mall is defaulting on its loans...
https://www.retaildive.com/news/american-dream-mall-misses-eight-million-loan-payment/642048/
Ah, classique! At least it’s living up to its name. Thank you for the progress report.
Thanks Christian & Anne -- my favorite part of the thread -- I hope the Jets and Giants are satisfied now. I would imagine football owners don't understand why anyone would build stuff anyhow -- get the taxpayers to pay for it instead!
The strangest part to me is that it's in Bergen County which still maintains Blue Laws. No shopping on Sunday! One of the strange but enjoyable quirks about Bergen County. I'm also pumped that they recently opened a H-Mart in the mall. Because, why not?!
Oh man, the H-Mart was OPEN? I saw it but it did not look like it! Huge missed opportunity.
One thing that was definitely NOTopen was the NEW JERSEY HALL OF FAME. Still under construction. But worth the wait, I'm sure.
Also I had no idea you can't shop on Sundays in Bergen County. Another very funny fact, then, about the nation's second-largest mall. Thanks Justin!
Love this article and your honesty. Also, lesson for a planner: what makes the world most interesting is the things that we couldn’t or wouldn’t have planned.
Thanks Meredith! "May you live in interesting times."
"I'm not a monster after all!" ❤️❤️❤️
:))))
Hah! I love this piece. And I know that feeling well of earnestly wanting to be awed and not being able to find anything awesome. Favorite line of many favorite lines: "The place felt like heaven might feel if you were the only person on earth who’d been good." Finally: I want the Oreo Shake! Yum!!
Jane: Oreo shakes when we finally meet up!
You know what actually does NOT disappoint when you finally see it in person? Natural wonders.
I remember the first time I saw the Grand Canyon. I was like, "No. No f-ing way. This is ridiculous. I just don't know what to do!"
Same with Niagara Falls. I'm from Buffalo so I've seen it maybe 50 times. But each time I return it's still, "Oh My F-ing God. NO WAY."
I wholeheartedly agree!
Malls are so weird! And I say this as a child of the 90s who met her friends “at the mall”. Just the concept of stuffing a bunch of stores together along with an amusent park and a food court! And no windows. Still, I loved your line about about how YOU were the weirdest attraction there. Haha
Jillian I tried to think of what American Dream resembled and the best I could come up with is that if we had to colonize a planet where you couldn't go outside because the air was poisonous and EVERYTHING had to be inside, we might build something like the American Dream mall. But the funny thing is, you CAN breathe the air on planet Earth, but they still built the American Dream mall. Why?
Hahaha!!
Perfect metaphor...or simile...or comparison..."The American Dream." It did seem futuristic in their day.
I watched a short video recently in a class I am taking. Had a funny bit of dialog. Why are we thinking about building an indoor Earth on Mars while we are likely ruining the planet and making Earth more like Mars?
Why indeed!!!
For the old-timers: I always like to know if they think the world's truly crazier now, or if every generation just thinks they're living through "unprecedented" times.
Oh I LOVE this question! Thank you Amran!
best thing about open heart surgery at the Nickelodeon Amusement Park would be proximity to vast mall food courts, no?
LOL Yes. Especially the "Deep Fried Love" kiosk in the third floor food court where you can enjoy fried mac-and-cheese bites and corn dogs followed by fried cheesecake.
killin me lunchtime!!
I forgot to include that one in my funniest sentences! Heart Surgery at the cleanest place on Earth!! LOL!!
I think ALL malls are weird -- being the epitome of artificiality 😅. And you inspired some research: As a fierce animal lover, I'm asking myself: Kangaroo and ostrich jerky -- they import the creatures from Australia? Who exports them? And as always: thank you for introducing me to strange and fascinating places, without having to go myself 😉.
Thank you Jessica! And you are right, ALL malls are weird, in their mall-ness. I'm almost rooting for them now that they have become sort of the retail underdog.
Don't you wonder how a mall like this manages to stay in business? While the primary focus is real estate, the underlying shops have little to offer and eventually cycle out because they can't make rent. Seriously, the Oreo store? Are there that many fans willing to buy Oreo merchandise?
I prefer to think of them as fronts, seedy underworld businesses that are laundering cash... because it's more interesting than a guy who loved beef jerky enough to start a beef jerky outlet. If I ever see a paper store in one of these malls I'm calling those shenanigans.
My daughter insists all mattress stores are fronts 🤷♀️
Now that you mention it, yes, the Oreo store is WAY more interesting as a front.
What is a paper store?
Haha, I mean like a store that literally just sells white paper... even better a store that just sells paperclips, where your first thought is this has to be a front 🤣
One of the all-time great and early SNL skits (Belushi, Aykroyd, Radner) "The Tape Store". It starts around 54 minutes...still great and had to be a front :) https://archive.org/details/saturday-night-live-s-04-e-02-fred-willard-devo-10-14-1978
"When this roll runs out, I'm coming right back here!"
So great. I would totally make a special trip to go to this store.
If the mall can get large enough they could put the paperclip and paper stores next door :) -- SNL is just like big malls -- constantly reinventing -- at times the cynics think it will die -- kinda like an organism which figures out how to adapt
Many property management companies have the tenants pay for most to all operating expenses, while the charged rent goes to paying off the construction loans. They can stay in business because as long as enough tenants keep coming, they have enough cash flow to pay off their loans and pay for the mall's running costs.
‘Varick’ has a nice ring to it.
Oh yes! So elegant!
As an Aussie (Australian), I’m learning a lot about America from your posts. I was born in Sydney and remember when we all flocked to ‘Roselands’ when it opened in 1965. Traffic jams as everyone tried to check out this new experience. So amusing to see that it currently only has 3187 parking spaces. It seemed enormous to me at the time. Thanks for all the fun reads. A very different world.
Beth, your comment lead me to Google "World's Largest Parking Lot" and the Guiness World Record goes to Canada's West Edmonton Mall, with 20k spaces. I guess they have not heard about the American Dream Parking Miracle!
What I think is more interesting though is that you have to pay to park after the first 30 minutes. That just seems CRAZY to me!
Glad you are enjoying the newsletter!
What did you have for lunch???
Oh this is very sad. Unsalted peanuts and a protein bar. Because that's what fit in my purse. I hate carrying stuff around!
Very nourishing and healthy. Good for your gut microbes which, according to health experts, help everything including your mood. Those little anchorites walled up in the Cathedral of St. Bowel the Irritable!
Anne, your columns are so delightful. Love what you are doing!!!!!!!
Oh this made me so happy! Glad you are enjoying. Thank you D'Arcy!
Many guffaws were had thanks to this post. Thank you Anne!
YAY!!!! Thank you B.A.!!!