Nothing to do on weekend, lets go down to Forum (a mall in Bangalore). It seems that people are running short of ideas these days on what to do on weekends. But one idea which still tickles up is visiting the nearby mall.
If I am right (doesn’t matter much even if I am wrong) the word Mall has its origin from the pedestrian shopping street one commonly sees in a hill station. Those crowded streets selling sweaters, chinese toys, handicrafts and metal jewelery kind off stuff. A mall in a city brings all that in an air-conditioned environment with loads of stuff to buy, loads of money to spend and loads of time to pass. So I will first try to etch out a definition for mall.
A mall is a place in city where people go to pass time and spend money and eventually pep up country’s ever growing GDP.
Organised Retailing has been good for the country, in creating new jobs, in creating good places for people to spend their time and eventually increasing sales of everything. Rather than beating too much around the bush I would like to put up some of my rather discursive thoughts on the Mall situation,
* People go to Mall when they have got time and money to spend. Even you don’t have money time can be spent. But time is money so eventually if you don’t buy anything you end up suffering an economic loss.
* Creation of so many malls have not only hit the small dukaanwaala’s business. What about Sulabh Shauchalaya business, it has been hit even harder with people getting much better avenues of reaching a restroom.
* Malls are addictive, people get addicted to either shopping or window shopping.
* Malls are the new hot-spots for PDA’s. No wonder Gardens in Bangalore and other cities have taken the backseat.
* Malls are so crowded that you bang into one or more of your acquaintances every time you visit it, and then you start living with a misconception of you having a huge social network.
* Window Shopping in Malls= (Actual Shopping in Malls) ^ 3476
Last fact is simply gut feel, I sometimes wonder how they make up the money for paying the bills. Ofcourse its always not on the gray side. Quite simply its promoting a consumer culture is India (quite similar to one witnessed by America in the 60’s) other than making great amount of money for everyone (it is, even if I say its not). Malls are as much a lifestyle component as a mobile phone, and the spread is equally fast ( Retail Shmetail by Sidin takes you through all the aspects of Indian Malling Industry). A personal preference on who wants to visit and for what purpose, malls are here to stay and setup a weekend mallscape for everyone.
p.s.- The author is also a regular visitor to Malls and a contributer to Retail GDP, although he is quite confused on why he visits them in the first place.
Oh yes, I agree with that bit about how more ppl are window shopping in a mall than the no. of ppl who are actually shopping. But sometimes while window shopping, one can’t help but buy! It has happened to me and to many others, that is the real intention I guess!
I thought I’d just hang around at forum, but I come back with a few books from landmark, dinner mats, a hand mixer, a few CDs and dinner at MacD’s… see, what the malls do…!
But this is not everyone’s story, most folks I see , are there only for window shopping, the go up and down the escalators couple of times, stand by the theatres and look down, gape at expensive pens and cameras, have a small dinner at transit and return.