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Malls in Mumbai | MMR (Mumbai Metropolitan Region)

290K views 603 replies 89 participants last post by  koresh 
#1 · (Edited)
This thread is only for Malls in/around | Mumbai |(| Mumbai |,| Thane and Navi | Mumbai |)

Here is list of Malls
Name City Year opened Size

1 High Street Phoenix | | Mumbai | 2008 | 3,300,000 sq ft (307,000 m2)
2 Inorbit Mall | Malad | Mumbai |2004 | 1,200,000 sq ft (111,000 m2)
3 Inorbit Mall | Vashi | Navi Mumbai | 2008 | 550,000 sq ft (51,000 m2)
4 Hindmata Mall | Dadar | Mumbai | 2008 |
5 Kalpataru Mall | Kandivali | Mumbai |2008 |
6 K Star Mall | Chembur | Mumbai |2008 |
7 Raguleela Mall[4] | Vashi | Mumbai |2007 | 3,750,000 sq ft (348,000 m2)
8 The Hub Mall | Goregaon | Mumbai |2006 | 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2)
9 Atria Millenium Mall[6] | Worli | Mumbai |2006 | 550,000 sq ft (51,000 m2)
10 Reliance Mart | Thane | Mumbai |2008 | 50,000 sq ft (4,600 m2)
11 Eternity Mall[7] | Thane | Mumbai |2006 | 500,000 sq ft (46,000 m2)
12 R Odeon Mall[8] | Ghatkopar | Mumbai |2006 | 500,000 sq ft (46,000 m2)
13 Growel 101 Mall[9] | Kandivli | Mumbai |2007 | 650,000 sq ft (60,000 m2)
14 City Center Mall[10] | Vashi | Navi Mumbai |2007 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
15 Orchid City Center Mall | Mumbai Central | Mumbai |2008 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
16 Dynamix Mall[12] | Juhu | Mumbai |2008 | 125,000 sq ft (11,600 m2)
17 Milan Mall[13] | Santacruz | Mumbai |2005 | 100,000 sq ft (9,300 m2)
18 Shagun Mall[14] | Goregaon | Mumbai |2005 | 90,000 sq ft (8,400 m2)
19 Infinity Mall[15] | Andheri | Mumbai |2005 | 265,000 sq ft (24,600 m2)
20 Infinity Mall[16] | Goregaon | Mumbai |2008 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
21 Heera Punna | Mahalaxmi | Mumbai |2008 |
22 R-Mall[17] | Mulund | Mumbai |2003 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
23 Nirmal Lifestyles | Mulund | Mumbai |2004 | 1,000,000 sq ft (93,000 m2)
24 R-Mall-2[18] | Thane | Mumbai |2010 | 300,000 sq ft (28,000 m2)
25 Wonder Mall[19] | Thane | Mumbai |2003 | 100,000 sq ft (9,300 m2)
26 Lake City Mall[20] | Thane | Mumbai |2008 | 600,000 sq ft (56,000 m2)
27 Metro Junction Mall | Kalyan | Mumbai |2007 | 1,500,000 sq ft (139,000 m2)
28 Crossroad Mall | Mumbai |1999 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2)
29 Akruti One World Mall | Andheri | Mumbai |2010 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
30 Akruti One World Mall | Thane | Mumbai |2010 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
31 Dreams the Mall[23] | Borivili | Mumbai |2008 | 315,170 sq ft (29,280 m2)
32 Dreams the Mall[24] | Bhandup | Mumbai |2008 | 1,100,000 sq ft (102,000 m2)
33 Dreams the Mall[25] | Vashi | Mumbai |2010 | 400,000 sq ft (37,000 m2)
34 Prime Mall Downtown[26] | Mumbai |2008 | 280,000 sq ft (26,000 m2)
35 Center One Mall[27] | Vashi | Mumbai |2003 | 125,000 sq ft (11,600 m2)
36 Cross Road II[28] | Nariman Point | Mumbai |2008 | 80,000 sq ft (7,400 m2)
37 Dheeraj Heritage[29] | Santacruz | Mumbai |2001 | 135,000 sq ft (12,500 m2)
38 Fun Republic[30] | Andheri | Mumbai |2002 | 130,000 sq ft (12,000 m2)
39 Cross Road II[31] | Nariman Point | Mumbai |2008 | 80,000 sq ft (7,400 m2)
40 Dheeraj Heritage[32] | Santacruz | Mumbai |2001 | 135,000 sq ft (12,500 m2)
41 Fun Republic[33] | Andheri | Mumbai |2002 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
42 Centurion[34] | Vashi | Mumbai |2005 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
43 Evershine Mall[35] | Malad | Mumbai |2002 | 125,000 sq ft (11,600 m2)
44 Hatane Shopping Centre | Andheri | Mumbai |2008 | 30,000 sq ft (2,800 m2)
45 Thakur Mall[37] | Kandivali | Mumbai |2001 | 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2)
46 Maxus Mall[38] | Bhayander | Mumbai |2007 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
47 Maxus Meghraj Mall[39] | Vashi | Mumbai |2009 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
48 Maxus Mall[40] | Kurla | Mumbai |2009 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
49 RNA NG Mall[41] | Mumbai |2010 | 600,000 sq ft (56,000 m2)
50 Raguleela Mall[42] | Kandivili | Mumbai |2007 | 400,000 sq ft (37,000 m2)
51 Thakur Mall[43] | Mira Road | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
52 Thakur Mall[44] Dahisar | Mumbai |2008 | 1,700,000 sq ft (158,000 m2)
53 Orchid Ozone Mall[45] | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 | 2,500,000 sq ft (232,000 m2)
54 Rassaz Mall[46] | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 |
55 Marathon Max Mall[47] | Mulund | Mumbai |2008 | 25,000 sq ft (2,300 m2)
56 Grand Hyatt Mall[48] | Kalina | Mumbai |2004 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
57 Tulip Arcade Mall[49] | Juhu | Mumbai |2008 | 200,000 sq ft (19,000 m2)
58 Nirmal Lifestyle II Mall| Mulund | Mumbai |2008 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
59 Cable Corp Mall[51] | Borivali | Mumbai |2008 | 170,000 sq ft (16,000 m2)
60 Hi way Mall[52] | Goregaon | Mumbai |2008 | 300,000 sq ft (28,000 m2)
61 Oberoi Mall[53] | Goregaon | Mumbai |2008 | 700,000 sq ft (65,000 m2)
62 Hypercity Mall[54] | Malad | Mumbai |2005 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
63 Big Thane Shopping Centre| Thane | Mumbai |2009 | 237,000 sq ft (22,000 m2)
64 Huma Mall[56] | Kanjur Marg | Mumbai | 2004 | 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2)
65 Sunrays Shopping Center | Kandivili | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
66 V Mall[58] | Kandivali | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
67 Viviana Mall[59] | Thane | Mumbai |2013 | 1,000,000 sq ft (93,000 m2)
68 Palm Beach Galleria[60] | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
69 Magnet Mall[61] | Bhandup | Mumbai |2010 | 175,000 sq ft (16,300 m2)
70 Metro Mall[62] | Bhandup | Mumbai |2010 |
71 HBS Centrix mall[63] | Bhandup | Mumbai |2010 |
72 Leo Mall[64] | Bhandup | Mumbai |2010 |
73 Littleworld[65] | Kharghar | Mumbai |2009 | 200,000 sq ft (19,000 m2)
74 Kohinoor City Mall[66] | Kurla | Mumbai |2009 | 300,000 sq ft (28,000 m2)
75 Prime Mall[67] | Kharghar | Mumbai |2010 |
76 Prime Mall | Vile Parle | Mumbai |2010 |
77 Citi Mall[68] | Andheri | Mumbai |2001 | 200,000 sq ft (19,000 m2)
78 Link Square Mall[69] | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 |
79 Lokhandwalas Open Air Mall| Andheri | Mumbai |2009 |
80 Mega Mall[71] | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
81 Nakshatra Mall | Dadar | Mumbai |2008 |
82 Orchard Road Mall | Kandivali | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
83 Om Arcade | Turbhe | Mumbai |2008 |
84 Seawood Mall | Seawood | Mumbai |2008 |
85 The Mall | Malad | Mumbai |2008 |
86 VN Mall | Bandra | Mumbai |2008 |
87 World Mall | Andheri | Mumbai |2008 |
88 Wedding City | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 |
89 Quantum Mall | Lower Parel | Mumbai |2008 |
90 Bandra Drive In | Bandra | Mumbai |2008 |
91 Crystal Point Mall | Andheri | Mumbai |2008 |
92 Eastern Mall | Malad | Mumbai |2008 |
93 Evershine Mall | Malad | Mumbai |2008 |
94 Fountain Square | Kharghar | Mumbai |2008 |
95 Fantasia Mall | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 |
96 Fun Zone | Borivali | Mumbai |2008 |
97 Full Stop | Nerul | Mumbai |2008 |
98 Galleria Shopping Mall | Powai | Mumbai |2008 |
99 Glomax mall | Kharghar | Mumbai |2008 |
100 Globus Mall | Bandra | Mumbai |2008 |
101 Gold City | Vashi | Mumbai |2008 | 120,000 sq ft (11,000 m2)
102 Mega Mall[72] | Andheri | Mumbai |2009 |
103 RCity[73] | Ghatkopar | Mumbai |2009 | 1,200,000 sq ft (111,000 m2)
104 Korum Mall[74] | Thane | Mumbai |2009 | 500,000 sq ft (46,000 m2)
105 Platinum Mall[75] | Ghatkopar | Mumbai |2009 |
106 HI LIFE Mall [76] | Santacruz | Mumbai |2010 |
107 Express Zone Mall [77] | Malad | Mumbai |2010 | 400,000 sq ft (37,000 m2)
108 Zoom Plaza [78] | Borivali | Mumbai |2010 |
109 The Zone Shopping Mall | Borivali | Mumbai |2010 |
110 Gokul Mall [80] | Borivali | Mumbai |2010 |
111 Lacera Mall [81] | Kandivali | Mumbai | 2008 | | 250,000 sq ft (23,000 m2)
112 Bayside Mall [82] | Haji Ali | Mumbai | 2009 |21,000 sq ft (2,000 m2)
113 Royal Palms shopping mall [83] | Goregaon | Mumbai| 2009 | 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2) [84]
114 Atlantic Mall [85] | Dadar | Mumbai | 2010 | 150,000 sq ft (14,000 m2)
115 D-Victorian Mall [86] | Borivili | Mumbai| 2010 | 140,000 sq ft (13,000 m2)
116 G7 Mall [87] | Andheri | Mumbai | 2010 | 130,000 sq ft (12,000 m2)
117 City Mall [88] | Andheri | Mumbai | 2009 | 130,000 sq ft (12,000 m2)
18 Palladium Mall [89] |Lower Parel | Mumbai |2009| 300,000 sq ft (28,000 m2)
119 Haiko Mall [90] |Powai| Mumbai |2009
120 Harmony Mall [91] |Mumbai |2010
121 Sej Plaza Shopping Mall [92] |Malad| Mumbai| 2009
122 Moksha Mall [93] |Mumbai| 2010
123 Little World Mall |Navi Mumbai| 2010
124 Rustomjee Eaze Zone mall |Malad West|Mumbai | 2011 |
125 High Street Mall |Thane West|Mumbai | 2010 |
126 Phoenix Marketcity | Kurla (W) | Mumbai | 2011 | 400,0000 sq ft (4 million sqft)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shopping_malls_in_Mumbai
 
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#581 ·
Not mentioned here,so mentioning.
There is an upcoming mall in Chembur called Cubic mall.Very small mall but looks much better than K star.
Located near to Bombay Presidency Golf Club,where old Basant Cinemas was there.
Currently Movietime cinemas(opened in early 2015) is open which has 6 screens including 1 dolby atmos.Ticket is cheap,quality is good.
Burger King will open within 2 weeks.
 
#583 ·
Luxe malls catch realty developers' fancy

Malls selling luxury brands are increasingly catching the fancy of property developers and corporate groups. At least half a dozen luxury malls are either being built or being planned, said realty sources.

Major luxury malls in the country are DLF Emporio in Delhi, The Collection (UB City) in Bengaluru and Palladium in Mumbai, selling top-end brands.
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Developers are looking to tap the demand from the ultra rich in metros and Mumbai is taking a lion's share of the new ones. Reliance Industries, for instance, is looking to build a luxury mall of "substantial size" in its convention centre project at the Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC), said a source in the company.

TAPPING OPPORTUNITIES
Mall developers are looking to tap the demand from ultra-rich in particular localities in metros

RIL is eyeing to build a luxury mall of 'substantial size' in its convention centre project in Bandra Kurla Complex in Mumbai

Maker Group aims to build a luxury mall in the BKC area

Mumbai-based Oberoi Realty is mulling to build a 500,000-sq ft luxury mall in Prabhadevi area of Mumbai

In Delhi, DLF is developing a 200,000-sq ft mall in Chanakyapuri area

"There is very little space available outside five-star hotels in Mumbai and its suburbs can take more of luxury properties. Besides, it is a high-premium locality and has a lot of propensity to spend," said the source.

Maker Group, which has a joint venture with Reliance for the Maker Maxity commercial complex in BKC, is also looking to build a luxury mall in the locality, said a source. The group is developing the mall as part of its MGM Bellagio hotel project there. Maker could not be reached for comments.

Mumbai-based Oberoi Realty is looking to build a 500,000 sq ft luxury mall in the city's Prabhadevi area, a mixed land-use project which will have a Ritz Carlton Hotel and The Residences managed by Ritz Carlton Mumbai. The company could not be reached for comments.

In Delhi, DLF is developing a 200,000 sq ft mall in the Chanakyapuri area and has already leased out 60 per cent of it. It is negotiating to lease out another 25 per cent. This mall is at the centre of the Lutyens' zone, housing the powerful and wealthy.

"Demand for luxury in the city is stable, and showing signs of growth," said Sriram Khattar, chief executive, rental business, DLF. It is spending Rs 350 to Rs 400 crore on this mall, scheduled to be completed by early next year. Khattar said the company had been able to show with Emporio, housing brands such as Gucci, Giorgio Armani, Canali and Jimmy Choo, among others, that they could offer luxury experience.

Anuj Puri, chairman of JLL India, says luxury malls in India have seen varied success. "Earlier ones, catering only to a particular category or segment, are repositioning themselves to include a more comprehensive trade and tenant mix. Often, a sharp focus on only luxury for HNI (high net worth) shoppers needs to be toned down, so as to be a bit more inclusive of potential shoppers from other income groups," he said.

Adding: "There is a lot of demand for luxury goods in India but apart from that class of wealthy shoppers, this demand can vary along with how the country is performing on a macro economic level. Appetite for luxury goes up in good times and decreases in not-so-good times."

In January this year, a study by business chamber Assocham said with increasing brand awareness and growing purchasing power of the upper class in tier-II and III cities, the Indian luxury market was expected to cross $18.3 billion by 2016 from the current $14.7 bn, a compounded annual growth rate of 25 per cent

Susil Dungarwal, chief mall mechanic at Beyond Squarefeet Advisory, a mall management entity, feels developers are looking at luxury malls as it adds brand value to their portfolio. "For instance, Emporio might not give better returns than Promenade (a mall in the vicinity) but it certainly adds value to DLF."

He says the cost of construction for a luxury mall is three times more than for a normal one but the returns are two times higher.

"Cost of construction of a luxury mall in Mumbai is Rs 12,000 a sq ft and for a normal mall is Rs 3,500 a sq ft," he said. And, that a normal mall commanded rent of Rs 350 a sq ft in South Mumbai but a luxury mall got Rs 700-Rs 800 a sq ft.
 
#585 ·
It was long overdure. Bandra deserves a premium multiplex. Hope SPI or PVR take over G7 and suburbia .

Bandra / Juhu badly need a luxury mall. But there is not even a single inch left for building anything. Very limited chances for rehabilitation or redevelopment projects unlike island city
 
#587 ·
INOX at R City: Where Technology Meets Opulence




Bollywood superstar Mr. Shah Rukh Khan inaugurates INOX at R-City, Ghatkopar, Mumbai along with Mr. Siddharth Jain, Director, INOX Group of Companies (left) and Mr. Alok Tandon, CEO, INOX Leisure Limited (extreme right). The 9 screen multiplex sprawling across 58000 square feet is a cinema connoisseur's delight. (PRNewsfoto/INOX Leisure Limited)
MUMBAI, May 12,2017 /PRNewswire/ --

Another 7-star experience by INOX for every cinema connoisseur in Mumbai
INOX Leisure Limited, India's premier multiplex chain, is taking the movie viewing experience to a brand new dimension. Soon after launching India's first Laserplex at Nariman Point, Mumbai, INOX launched yet another 7-star cinema experience sprawling 58000 square feet in R City Mall at Ghatkopar, Mumbai. The new 9-screen multiplex, designed for the genuine film connoisseurs, was launched by Bollywood Superstar, Shah Rukh Khan.

Conceptualized by award winning architects Mesbur Smith & Associates, the 9-screen multiplex boasts of the latest technology one can imagine today, and more. Equipped with an IMAX screen, India's first and only laser projection format with 300% enhanced picture quality, explosive Dolby ATMOS sound, stunning life-like 4K resolution and Volfoni Smartcrystal solution for the brightest 3D projection, INOX at R City is where movie viewing moves to untouched boundaries.
Commenting on his experience, Mr. Shah Rukh Khan said, "This place radiates extravagance. After experiencing this 7-star cinema marvel, I can truly say that cinema viewing has reached a new level, both in terms of technology and luxury. I wish INOX at R City the very best and give its audience a heads up to get spoilt by its 7-star services. Live the Movie!"
Speaking on the launch, Mr. Siddharth Jain, Director, INOX Group of Companies said, "I am excited to present before you, another 7-star INOX, at R City, Mumbai, the all new and the one-of-its-kind multiplex in India. This multiplex is a technological delight for any cinema lover, and a luxurious entertaining destination to get pampered, while watching a movie. It truly highlights our efforts to provide the very best, in movie viewing experience in the country."
This multiplex boasts of some first-ever experiences in a cinema in the country:
- Interactive automated Box Office - One can browse, choose and pay for tickets on the interactive screen, which mirrors on the opposite side, where an Office Assistant can assist, if needed.
- Interactive menu - The interactive touchscreens in the concessions area help one to browse through the menu, while ordering food and beverages.
- An enthralling 550 square feet LED video wall in the lobby with full color, ultra-bright, full motion dynamic real-life like content display, is the largest in any theatre.
- An interactive gaming zone powered on a huge LED touchscreen.
R City additionally houses INSIGNIA, INOX's signature experience, which is the last word in luxury cinema entertainment. With INSIGNIA, guests enjoy a gourmet menu curated by master Chef Vicky Ratnani, butler-on-call and service by staff dressed in designer uniforms by Arjun Khanna, among other features. It also has KIDDLES, a fun zone for the tiny tots. This space in the lobby is for young children to spend time playing games and engaging in some creative activities, before the movie.
 
#601 ·
Coming soon to a mall near you



Malls all over the country are struggling to survive. But as some successful ones in the city have shown, retail hubs need to look beyond shopping and reinvent themselves as community spaces.

On a Tuesday afternoon, the lobby of the oncebustling CR2 mall at Nariman Point wears a deserted look. An antique goods store at the end of one aisle, and several other shops, are left completely unattended, some even while their doors remain wide open. Prayash Sanganeria, the owner of Prime, a home products store on the ground floor, tells us his eight-year-old shop has been developing its own clientele in the neighbourhood and online, “so we don’t have to rely on the business of those who visit the mall.” Footfalls, he says, “have fallen by about 60 per cent in the last four years.”

If those four years have taught mall owners anything, it’s that the key to surviving and thriving in this business is an ability to rapidly evolve into community hubs. The once-vibrant landscape of retail is, today, dotted with many malls that have turned into desolate places — properties that simply weren’t able to keep up with the changing times.

Less than two months ago, this paper reported that Bhandup’s Dreams The Mall, had started falling apart over the last three years, despite being located on busy LBS Road, and just a stone’s throw away from the railway station. When Mirror visited it, the three-storey structure that once housed a cinema, a superspecialty hospital, over 1,000 retail shops and a food court, had no water in its washrooms, no central air-conditioning, no housekeeping and no security services. It had turned into a garbage dump with corridors littered with dog poop and empty bottles of alcohol. Last year Bhandup’s Magnet Mall — a massive 10 lakh-square-foot complex, that had turned into a money pit for owners Neptune Developers — also shut down. The largely-vacant mall’s annual property tax alone, sources estimate, would have been more than Rs 25 crore.

At Thane’s Korum Mall, where at least two brands are likely to shut shop by next month, the salesman of a fashion boutique tells us: “On Dussehra day, despite the festival, we only had a handful of customers coming by. You are the first person to enter today.” And judging by the condition of Eternity and Wondermall — which were among the first to open in this part of the city — these, too, are struggling to stay afloat. When asked to comment, a spokesperson for the Kanakia Group, which owns both properties, told Mirror: “We are no longer in the mall business.”



Gulam Zia, an executive director at Knight Frank India isn’t surprised by these examples. “About 50 per cent of the malls in India are struggling, and only about 20 per cent are doing reasonable business. In most major metros, just three or four malls are really thriving, and in the Tier II and III towns, not more than one or two really work,” says Zia. Dr Subash Bhola, a director with Jones Lang LaSalle tells us that malls which are floundering have 30 to 40 per cent vacancies, when it comes to shops and retail outlets.

Bhola points out that the organisedretail real estate market has been witnessing consolidation for some time now, “and while there is a demand for quality retail space, malls of poor or average quality are struggling due to factors such as deteriorating tenant profiles, dilapidated structures, strata sales (where the property is sectioned into small shops which are sold off to small, independent companies), lack of a vibrant tenant mix, poor mall management or, in some cases, simply a poor choice of location.” The rise of e-commerce has some role to play in this too: Millennials, for instance, don’t feel the need to physically visit a mall any more to do their shopping

While experts do not believe this points to a retail apocalypse — indeed, a September 2018 white paper by Anarock Property Consultants, titled Rebirth Of Retail Malls, points out that the retail sector in India is expected to grow from $672 billion in 2017 to $1.3 trillion in 2020 — they do feel that in order to survive, leave alone thrive in the competitive world of retail, mall developers will have to reimagine their properties and put ‘customer experience’ (rather than traditional retail) at the forefront of their business strategies.

International management consulting and analytics firm McKinsey had highlighted this four years ago. In a report on the future of shopping malls, the firm had also predicted that sustainability concerns would lead consumers to opt for development projects where working and shopping would be within walking distance of where they live, and that a shrinking size of residences (thanks to the rising prices of realty) would translate into a greater need for public spaces where people may meet and socialise (think restaurants and event venues).

Well before that report was made public, a few farsighted mall developers in Mumbai had already started tweaking their properties to turn them into ‘mixeduse venues’ offering customer experiences. Rajendra Kalkar, President (West) of The Phoenix Mills Ltd, which owns the eponymous Lower Parel mall that is hailed as the indisputable market leader in the industry today, says: “When we started [the Palladium] in 2010, not many wanted to come to this location. But the area developed and we, on our part, planned things well. We had two objectives: to make it look and feel great for the consumer, and to build the sort of space that would attract the right kind of retailers so that consumers would come in and shop more.” Today, the Lower Parel mall sees an average footfall of 75,000 to 80,000 people per day —about eight times the number of visitors to malls of a comparable size.

Achieving this involved shuffling the shops around to facilitate a flow of consumer traffic; demarcating zones and placing certain brands together for customer convenience; deciding the terms of contracts on a case-to-case basis; changing the façade and décor so customers don’t grow bored; and also engaging with them through events, like High Street Phoenix’s annual Cool Japan event, which is touted as India’s largest Japanese culture and cuisine festival, and regular live music concerts, which the company also hosts at its Market City property in Kurla. Like Phoenix, Infiniti (Andheri) and Viviana (Thane) malls also host musical events on weekends now. Kalkar tells us that such events are major crowd-pullers. “Smaller events generally register about 300 to 500 walk-ins, but music events like Awestrung attract some 1,800 to 2,000 people. Fashion events like Luxury Night Raid see an attendance of between 600 and 800,” Kalkar adds.

Kunal Vardhan, owner of Worli’s two lakh-square-foot Atria, which has recently witnessed a revival, woke up to these truths some years ago, he tells us. “When Atria opened, we sold 24 per cent of the shops on the frontage, which I thought was big mistake even then, but it helped us raise liquidity to buy the land. The space, at the time, was designed to be a commercial building, with offices,” Vardhan says. “We opened as a mall in 2006, and in 2008, at its peak, we were seeing a maximum of about 25,000 people a day. Around the same time, we had completed our Dadar mall, an 80,000-square-foot structure, that remained empty for three years. Malls were failing all across Mumbai then.”

His experience with these properties taught Vardhan that the strata-sales model just didn’t work. In the absence of cohesive leadership, individual shops that didn’t fare well would simply lie abandoned, and fall into disrepair over time, ruining the look and feel of the mall. So some years ago, Vardhan started buying back the shops he had sold, and leasing out larger areas to F&B ventures and popular lifestyle brands, in a bid to breathe life back into his malls. Two years ago, he rented out half of the top floor of Atria to a high-end cinema. “When it opened in 2017, I was the first to buy two tickets and I knew right away that I was on the right track,” says Vardhan. About a month ago, his mall saw the launch of 25,000-square-foot amusement arcade. “A month from now, every fortnight you’ll hear of a new restaurant opening at Atria,” Vardhan adds.

The management of Korum appears to be thinking along similar lines. Aside from a handful of new high-end stores, restaurants and bars, the mall now has a new Smaaash sports facility (a gaming arcade with facilities like bowling and cricket) too. Those who haven’t yet identified the new direction they want to take as far as community engagement goes, are going back to fix some basics. Viviana Mall has carried out a detailed analysis of its customer-profile, and has hired an external agency to visit the outlets anonymously and draw up a report on what’s working and what isn’t. “Only 52 per cent of our customers are from Thane. The rest are from Navi Mumbai, Mumbai and even cities like Pune and Nashik, who are drawn by the reputation of the mall,” says COO Guruvineet Singh. Alongside this, Viviana has also decided to revisit some ‘hygiene’ issues. It monitors the water quality in the kitchens of its onsite dining outlets and even monitors the cleanliness of the staff’s clothes. “We have taken action against six outlets for violations,” adds Singh. “We terminate the contract after a second violation.”

JLL’s Bhola feels that while ‘anchor tenants’ who drive traffic will continue to be vital to a mall’s success, more and more malls will soon include pop-up venues and flexible spaces that can accommodate different vendors and experiences over time. He estimates that going forward, developers will earmark more than half the space in their malls for experiential retail (immersive experiences like arcades and arts events), spas, co-working spaces, and perhaps even short-term accommodations, and the other half will include not just shopping but also entertainment venues and finedining restaurants, which will engage the community. Accommodating all of this, adds Zia, means that a mall would ideally require about half a million square feet of space. “Smaller properties will simply not be able to deliver on all these fronts,” he adds.

But there’s no exact formula for how that space must be allocated. Even if there was, Sandeep Runwal of the Runwal Group, would tell you that it wouldn’t result in success without active management. The group runs four R Malls in Mumbai and Thane, and is planning to launch two more — in Andheri-Kurla Road and Pune — soon. “The business model has changed substantially since 2001, and to keep customers coming back, you have to keep reinventing yourself. How effectively the management can integrate the mall with the larger community, is what will determine its success,” says Runwal, who doesn’t mind admitting that he has gone back to the drawing board to revive the R Mall in Thane.

That mall developers like him are now not only willing to change, but they are also better equipped to do so, can only lead to a superlative experience for customers. JLL’s Bhola explains that malls will, for instance, rely heavily on technological tools like visitor-tracking programmes and analytics (through mobile apps, and loyalty programmes) to optimise the experience of customers. Referring to a 2018 JLL report on the future of Indian real estate, Bhola offers an example: Video analytics, he says, may be used to improve merchandise placement, and to offer greater visibility to popular brands by positioning these in areas that are seen to be the most populated, based on a heat-map analysis of the mall. “Given the advances in artificial intelligence, in the very near future, malls will know what you need before you do,” Bhola says.

Mumbai Mirror

Mall bubble finally bursted........
 
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