photo by cote

Shortly after we first moved to the area, my wife and I decided to go see a movie, so we found one in the paper and decided to go see it at the ‘Bow Tie Cinema’, which had a street address.

We tried to find the theatre and could not, mindlessly driving around downtown Stamford. We called the theatre, and they told us it was in the ‘Stamford Town Center’, which was of no additional help, because we didn’t know what that meant.

Once we actually found the parking entrance to mall, we got lost trying to find the theatre, as there are precious few signs, and you kind of ‘leave’ the main mall to go down some nondescript corridors to find the theatre at streetside. Oh and we missed the movie.

So, although it is far closer to us than White Plains, we just never go to the Stamford Town Center, because in my mind, its kind of a pain in the ass.

All of which is really completely irrelevant babble to today’s news that the Stamford Town Center is up for sale by its owners, that Taubman Group and UBS Realty Investors LLC. From the Stamford Advocate story, the owners are characterizing it it as a portfolio diversity move that has nothing to do with the profitability of the mall. In fact, it sounds like its one of their crown jewels that they would like to cash in on.

No, the mall is not closing and it should have no effect on the stores or shoppers - in fact, Taubman says if it doesn’t sell they will continue to operate it.

However, as the article mentions, the ‘closed’ mall theme so popular years ago has lost much of its popularity:

“enclosed malls receive less than 16 percent of U.S. retail sales, down from 38 percent in the mid-1990s. Smaller, open-air shopping centers, also known as lifestyle centers, have become more popular in recent years, he said.”

(’Lifestyle Centers’ = ‘Norwalk Strip Malls’)