The Downtown Mall currently has Big Lots as an anchor while a Tops supermarket (former Bi-Lo) serves as a shadow anchor in the parking lot. The only other national tenants in the mall besides anchor Big Lots is a mall-based Dollar General and H&R Block. Everything else is locally owned and operated.
The only additional comment to be made on the mall is that Big Lots was a former Fishers Big Wheel department store. I'm unsure of the build date as there isn't a whole lot of information on this mall.
The mall has multiple entrances, but the two that stand out the most are the 'downtown direct' entrance and the mall parking entrance. Both entrances are dramatically different as seen below.
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| Somewhat modernized entrance to the mall's parking lot. |
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| Very vintage entrance from pedestrians coming from downtown Meadville. |
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| Big Lots (former Weston's) |
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| A long corridor to Dollar General |
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| Dentist at the mall. |
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| Big Lots has a wall that divides furniture and mattresses from the rest of the store. One must navigate through the displays to reach the mall or the rest of Big Lots. |
I agree with your statement that other malls could learn from this one! They could become great local assets with many service businesses. However, that format may not work as well for malls that were built specifically to be shopping meccas and as a result aren't really in a local, centralized community like this one. I guess it will just depend on which types of mall go under first...
ReplyDeleteVery true. I wasn't meaning that super big malls should use this strategy. I was referring more to a local one. The mall size, if you ask me, should be taken in consideration.
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ReplyDeleteI believe Tops replaced Quality. ..It and bi lo had been part of Penn Traffic.Quality had its stores in northwest Pa.. (Erie,Crawford,Warren counties) ,and SW New York..
ReplyDeleteThat is correct, except this location was a Bi-Lo instead.
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