Johnstown Galleria: A Dying Mall with an image problem - Raw & Real Retail

This was shot at the Johnstown Galleria on August 31, 2018.

While filming, I bumped into the grandson of the original developer of this and other malls in PA, Christopher Zamias. He told me he is a big fan of the dead mall videos on youtube, and that this mall is not a dead mall. He was adamant that they had 86% capacity not counting anchor stores and that I should get as much film coverage from the active part of the mall as the dead part to present a fair point of view.

Armed with permission from mall management, I set about to do just this, and managed to get a fair picture of this struggling mall. Communication being the weakest link in any company, I still managed to get reprimanded by security regardless of what one of the owners pleaded with me to do. Seeing as how it was as I was leaving the mall anyway it was a moot point.

In any case, I walked away with a slightly different point of view than that of the optimistic Mr. Zamias. He admits the mall is dying, but it is nowhere near dead. I have to respectfully disagree. It may come down to a difference in perspective, as the mall is not empty, but it certainly is not well.

The shifting demographics of the area, the poor performance of department store anchors in general, the lack of any signage whatsoever on the roadway, the location on top of a mountain, and the blind optimism of the owners all serve to create a very big image problem for this mall.

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I'd like to say a few words about being an ambassador to your local malls. We have been taking the time to visit all the malls within a reasonable driving distance to check up on them and see how they are doing. Also filming an updated video every year or so, regardless of the lack of many changes, just so there is a video record of the health over time. We think this is an important thing to keep tabs on, especially in these wildly turbulent times. The current health emergency has accelerated the impending Retail Apocalypse we've all been talking about these last several years. This was already a big problem, but the shutdowns and restrictions have made the issue 5x worse and likely hastened the death of the enclosed shopping mall.

I know we've all been on pins and needles wondering how bad the fallout is going to be from all of this.

There really is no way to know exactly unless we ALL go and do our small part to make it known how it turns out. I implore you, if you have the means to pick an area you would like to be an ambassador for, and go document your local malls. Whatever your medium, it doesn't matter, any and all documentation is necessary and vital in this day and age. Whether it be on Social Media, Flickr, Youtube, any platform gets it out there and preserves it for posterity. We can't paint this picture unless we all grab a brush...


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  / rawandrealretail  


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