Hey, Ace...I remember this mall in its heyday. The Morrisville Outlet Mall opened up as an alternative to some of the major outlet centers in NC, including the now-abandoned Burlington Outlet Center (now Outlet Village) and the outlet center at nearby Smithfield. Saks Fifth Avenue's Off Fifth and Dress Barn were the primary stores, along with an antique mall that opened later, and a very decent food court. You'd think that the traffic from Durham, Raleigh, and the RDU Airport would have sustained it more, and didn't-and four other big centers that opened up (Durham's Streets of Southpoint, Mebane's Tanger Outlet Center, and Raleigh's Triangle Towne Center, all alive and well; and the now-struggling Cary Towne Center) were factors that really increased the downfall. But this was a very "cutesy" little outlet mall back in the day, at least from the two visits I made there.
I know this mall. I'm shocked it's still there. I used to shop there at the end of when it was thriving, and then during the decline. When I first moved to the Raleigh, NC area, in about 1996, it was full of shops, near 100% if not fully occupied, and was pretty busy whenever I visited. However, Crabtree Valley Mall in Raleigh was the premier mall that was the destination mall in Raleigh, the mall that was so crowded around Christmas that the lots and garage were full, with traffic jams. Anyway, in this Morrisville mall there was a major chain bookstore outlet and a kitchen-type outlet store, among many of the usual outlet stores. I'd say it was declining possibly as early as maybe 2005, and by 2010 it was probably more than half vacant. It always was a beautiful building, with those great hardwood floors and overall pleasant look. Why did it fail? I think it was TOO centrally located in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area. It is near the airport and near the Research Triangle Park, a.large area of tech business campuses. People pass this mall on the way to and from work, but don't stop. Most who commuted to work in RTP lived in Raleigh and Durham, and those cites had closer malls, and the area economy was booming such that few needed of wanted to go further for the cheaper goods. And who wanted to drive 95% of the way back to work to shop in the evening or on weekends? Then in the earlish 2000s another big, new, popular mall opened in south Durham, The Streets at Southpoint. Another mall in Raleigh that died was North Hills mall in Raleigh. I witnessed the decline, death, and rebirth of that one. It was almost completely empty except for Sears. They bulldozed all but the Sears and rebuilt an open air mall with a 2 story Target and movie theater and restaurants. It was doing great, I haven't seen it since about 2012 though.
I remember going to this mall all the time when I was little. I used to love going to the food court, with the smell of freshly baked soft pretzels drifting across the wall, luring me in. I remember the neon lights leaving hues of pink and blue across the halls as I walked down them. It's very sad to see this relic of my early childhood a shell of what it once was. Thank you for this video!
Can't wait for the coming NC content! I remember being so impressed by the flooring in this place. A shoe and kitchen outlet are two stores that stick out in my memory (late 90s to mid 00s) and decent options at the food court. A co-worker mentioned recently that the Chinese restaurant did finally close.
I grew up in the area and used come here when it was already nearly dead with only consignment shops and a sax off 5th in the mid 2000s. They built it in the middle of a huge industrial park hoping that it would take off as a place people would shop at close to work, but it really only was popular as a food court to get some lunch at. It was too far away from any residential areas and traffic made it hard to get in and out of hence why it failed.
Nostalgic! I grew up in neighboring Durham,NC and can remember going to this mall when I was a child. The wood floors are still as shiny as they were back then (mid to late 90's)! I can't remember what which stores where there back then but still good to see it one more time before its eventually demolished.
OH. MY. GOD. My parents and siblings went to the grand opening of Owings Mills Mall. I grew up there. My sister learned to drive in the parking lot. That food court is giving me SERIOUS feels for my lost friend, OMM. They're working on redeveloping the site in Owings Mills. I was there an 3 months ago and they were working on the foundation of the new town center they're replacing the mall with. I'm actually crying. Conservatory was such a stupid name, but it was a gorgeous food court.
Yes my company is doing all the dirt work and paving it’s supposed to be like 20 stores Costco and Lowe’s are supposed to open up soon. The lot is like 50 plus acres
@@gabekless3107 thanks for the info! I live just across the state line these days, but I grew up in Reisterstown in the 90s. OMM has a soft spot in my heart.
I remember going here as a child for a Pokémon trading card tournament. Even in 2008 the food court was mostly dead but I'm surprised at how nice the rest of it looks! Thanks for covering this
Not sure about Owings Mills but the food court reminds me more of Rolling Acres just more open. The way the food court sign hangs, the tables and chairs, the colors, and the designs of the restaurants like the taco place.
I really want to drive my Geo Metro in there and get a good picture of it with the palm trees in the background! It'd be a beautiful picture to have some light vaporwave music over
This mall was right by my office, and the food court still had some restaurants in it until about 2 years ago, when they shut it down for good. My coworkers and I called it the "Ghost Mall". I'd go there for lunch every once in a while. Had a Subway, Greek Fiesta, Steak Escape, and a Chinese place if I recall. They've started demolishing it, but I have no idea what's going to be built in its place. Great video!
Outlet malls are at the very bottom of the hierarchy of malls. I have 2 near me in Ohio. Aurora Farms and Prime Outlets in Lodi. Both sell stuff that the manufacturer can't for whatever reason but at no real savings. Cooking stores are prime examples. They sell the same Wusthof knives I have in my kitchen for the same price as William Sonoma for example. Once in a while you get a good deal. But most of the time things are the same price as the store. Maybe a shoe deal if you get lucky. There are a few nice outlets. Tanger outside of Columbus is pretty swank but not helpful at all to me as they don't sell things in my size. Thankfully malls still do exist so places like Ticknors sell and tailor dress shirts to fit at a reasonable price. The only redeeming value of Tanger is Columbus is 20 minutes away with Cabela's at Polaris, Ikea, Rogue Fitness and Schmidt's Sausage Haus for tasty German food.
In some places outlet malls are doing very well. There is one in Northern Ky. that tends to be packed quite often. Do you know manufacturers now actually make product to sell at their "outlet stores"? The items are slightly different(read lesser quality, usually) than the premium offerings at mainstream malls, or from the company non outlet sale points. Clothing, and shoes are the biggest offenders here with some mainstream stores not recognizing,or accepting returns on outlet product, because there is a difference.
Awesome video. Love that neon. Kinda surprising to see an outlet mall still standing, lol. At least its getting some use. I always thought outlet malls were kinda pointless, like the sore thumb, lol.
Jennifer Jones And we just got an outlet Mall called “Outlet Collection” in Winnipeg, but with Higher-End stores? If that makes sense, and they just opened a brand new Popeyes’s Louisiana Kitchen restaurant, and there were huge line ups, but we are fortunate that we have a large Filipino population, because they love malls and love shopping
I oddly overlooked this video for a great while, and not sure how I missed it all these months! But better late than never, I finally got to this video. Nice explore of this place, and too bad it's totally dead except for UNC having some college classes(I guess?) occur in some of the former store spaces inside here. Too bad the chinatown mall idea, fell through.
I went to this mall last year about this same time, it's a beautiful mall. I went back about 2 months ago and it's still used for the reasons you mentioned but the mall has been closed to the public now and you can't get in without being in one of the classes and taking a back entrance unfortunately
Thank you for some still shots. I have to look away and pause it usually. I still did that bt the still shots were nice. Do you know why the mall plans fell through?
It is hard to believe that they were going to make that a Chinatown Mall and five years later they still haven't done it what a shame in some perfectly good buildings.
What an awesome video. Surprised even outlet malls are failing. This place had a Saks off fifth and other stores. Maybe too pricey. The design is so 90s. Malls need to bring back bright colors and neon instead of bland neutral black and grey Thought the Chinatown repurposing project was recent. Five years! Doubting it will ever happen. Looking forward to more in your southern retail miniseries
@@Catmannj1 agreed, Chinatown projects only do well with a large asian population, mostly in the Coastal states. Hell, hispanic stores would probably do better.
This place was actually built in the mid 80s but I think renovated in the 90s. Almost in the middle of sticks back then. Raleigh and Durham have all merged due the population growth explosion. Morrisville went from 500 people in 1985 to 25,000 in 2020 but the mall still died. Other more popular shoppings areas have opened so everything shifted to those areas. They are turning/recycling the mall into office space now so should bring that area back to life.
Dead malls are great places to study if you live near one. Usually pretty quiet, tons of tables, lots of bathrooms and places to take a break and walk. Easy to plan study groups.
I’m from the area. The mall has been dead for some time there. We actually use to have our Pokémon card league there from like 2010-2014 or so. It was a dead mall then. Really the only thing keeping the food court alive was trading card leagues that would come in on the weekend. And then announced that China town and we all got kicked out. Glad to see what has come of it. Lol sarcasm. Great video!
Another city I lived in (Raleigh)- in 1988 VP Dan Quayle came to Raleigh and the plane landed at the airport across I-40 and a limo took him over to this outlet mall- it was sad. This outlet mall never really took off.
My office is not far from this mall. I would occasionally go to the food court for lunch over the years. Restaurants would slowly close one at a time. An Asian restaurant and a place that sold cheesesteaks, gyros, etc were the last two. At some point last year I tried to enter through the food court entrance and the doors were locked so I assume all restaurants are closed now.
I seriously wanna buy one of these neon filled 80s malls one day! Rebuild the Radioshack store re open Toys r Us and a retro Arcade plus vaporwave and 80s music playing throughout the mall. And the theater only plays classic John Hughes films and Back to the Future.ha And just spend my days walking the mall basking in glorious neon and the arcade basically og Dawn of the Dead!🤣lol
I live up the road from this mall. Was literally going to go to there the very weekend you posted this... Could you inform me of what other dead malls there might be in the area?
It is such a shame that this mall closed down. I remember going to this mall and the only thing I remember was a KB Toys outlet in this mall, when KB Toys was still around. There were some many great other stores throughout the mall. I think that the mall closed in 2005 or 2006, so it has been closed for quite some time now. With bigger malls that opened up in the area, that is why I believe this mall closed down. Hopefully someone will save it and repurpose it. I don't think anything has been done to this mall yet.
Guess the financing and/or tenants to lease the space fell through. A Chinese themed mall needs to be in an area where there is an existing large Asian presence. As an example there is a very large Asian population in the north east portion of Toronto and of the municipalities immediately north of it (Markham and Richmond Hill). One if the Asian malls there (the Pacific Mall) is so large, literally 4 full versions of this mall could fit in it. You should go in to see it. The running (but sad) joke in the GTA, is that if you want to get a blue ray DVD of a movie that hasn’t come out yet, this is the place to go.
Could you shout out to Dead Malls by Jeff and Company? He mentions you in like every video. Seems like he’s desperately trying to get some recognition lol. No disrespect to him of course, but I’m just saying 🤷🏻♀️
Yeah, but the building still seems to be in excellent shape. I'm guessing that either the current owner is keeping it up with an eye towards selling it to someone who'll keep it intact, or he's still trying to attract investors.
Hey Anthony, love y o ur MALL tour videos, I wanted to ask you, what mall is in Tom Petty's FreeFalling video, it kinda looked like Century Link, Cincinnati Mills, if you can check it o ut, I noticed he was in a Mall play in. In the video, Left a Big Like here,
There must be complicated legal issues or hold out for the largest profit possible as to why this mall is not being redeveloped. The area around this mall is extremely busy with horrible traffic during especially when it is time to get off work. The RDU airport is just minutes away. Microsoft , Oracle and Lenovo are just around the corner. It does not make any sense why the is mall is just sitting there.
Such a nice looking mall... great video Anthony! Have a lot to do today... it's my birthday today... maybe some filming in a couple of days... take care. :)
Curt, not as many of them are failing as these videos would seem to indicate. Roughly 75% to 85% of the malls in the U.S. are still "healthy" (which usually means not more than 15-20% vacant). Most of the failing malls are in areas where they simply built TOO MANY malls. Either it's a bad location, or there are nicer malls within a few kilometers, or the demographics have changed and the mall didn't keep up with the new demographics. But for the most part, it's just retail space shrinking to a more sustainable level. I did some research, and there are still about 7.5 square feet (0.65 to 0.7 square meters) per person in the United States. The rest of the world? Less than 2 square feet (0.15 to 0.2 square meters) per person. We were too optimistic in the 70s and 80s and built way too much retail.
We actually just had several outdoor shopping areas open up near me in the past decade. Still growing, too. Most of these dead malls are dead because other malls/shopping areas opened with better traffic and amenities.
I did a little googling, and it looks like there is an Asian population northwest of Raleigh. And that I found an H Mart, and at least one mom and pop Asian grocery store and market on that side of the Raleigh area. Maybe it could've worked if this idea had been executed, after I researched how many such shops were in that part of the Raleigh metro area? It's too bad this project never occurred, over 5 years after it was announced. Anyway, it is still a good dead mall museum so to speak, of 1990s design.
Morrisville in almost all Indians at this point with mix of other Asians. Two large Hindu temples are in that area so Morrisville is an ideal area from them.
These types of ethnic-centered shopping centers will only do well if there is an IMMEDIATE population in the area. If there are hardly any Chinese in the area, it won't do well.
Could a concept like the "Mini China Town" be done without being cheesy? Real China Town communities are just that, real communities started by Chinese immigrants that wanted a neighborhood of their own, much like Little Italy, or other places of the sort. Those are authentic pieces of the Old country, and are fascinating to visit. I`ve actually been to China, and the China town districts are VERY much like being there. I`m kind of afraid that this mall project would end up being gimmicky, and "touristy", in a very bad way. That aside, what a GORGEOUS interior that building has!
