July 6, 2019 • 37 mins
The idea of selling snacks and meals in shopping centers is far from new, but mall food courts keep reinventing themselves. Anney and Lauren explore how the food court as we know it was born -- and what's replacing it.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hello, and welcome to save our protection. If I hear
radio and Steph Media, I'm any and I'm Lauren voge olbam.
And today we're talking about the food court. Yeah, the
food court, that one, the single food court, Like you
all know which one we're talking about, enough said, right right,
heavy wink. Mall food courts and food holes similar, yeah, yeah,
(00:32):
kind of kind of extrapolating out from there, but yeah,
mostly mall food courts. Yes, And this was an idea
that we had based on the new season of Stranger Things,
um which heavily features a mall food court. Yes. And
I believe since Stranger Things is filmed here in Atlanta,
where we also record our media, that's true. Hum. We
(00:56):
were just discussing that. I believe this was filmed at
the the original, the original mall that that I attended
here in Atlanta. I moved here like fourteen years ago,
and I moved like right right down the street from
the North Decam mall. And I think I believe that's
the one. I like. I like that in your universe
that is the original mall, the original I'll be defined
(01:19):
around the mall that you my original. I like it.
I like it's like a timeline thing. Um yeah, I
I I was saying that if anyone doesn't know about
North decap and they're in the Atlanta area, very cheap
movie tickets. Oh yeah, yeah, great for that really cheap. Yes,
And I as we record this tomorrow is the fourth
(01:42):
of July, and I will be running a race and
very unhappy about it. But then I'm gonna go home,
I'm gonna crash and I'm gonna watch things. Oh well, see,
that's that's delightful. Hopefully, hopefully you're going to do great
in your race, and the stranger things part will be
(02:03):
will hopefully be delightful. Just pretend I have those monsters
racing behind me. That is fine. And there's that Zombies
run app which is great. Yeah. And we recently spent
a lot of time in a mall food court a
decent amount of chime in Hawaii. Um shier kia, which
is a Japanese walk Yes, uh yeah, it's it's a
(02:24):
it's a yokocho, which is a type of a Japanese
concept of a food court within a mall situation. And
it was delightful. As we went back twice. We we did. Yeah,
we ate so much there, so much of it was
so card heavy and it was everything was beautiful. It
was it was um yea. And we went to another
(02:45):
one in Hawaii to we didn't spend as much time
in that one, but we went to another chese yeah. Um.
And speaking of I have been to food courts in
Japan and China and they have blown my friaking minds. Yeah. Wow,
they seem from from my experiences in Hawaii, Uh, they
seem to be much much larger and more hectic and
(03:08):
more alcohol based, yes, than what you consider when what
you typically think of, I think yeah, and when the
ones I'm thinking of, there are a lot more options.
There's so many options for everything. Yeah, you want bubble
t there's like fifteen types you want stir fry types
like yeah, sure, it's a lot going on. And also
(03:32):
Lauren and I have both agreed that thanks to Silent Hill,
a few things are as frightening as an abandoned mall
in the food courts involved in that. Yeah, a lot
of a lot of scary movies take place and closed
are abandoned malls. I'm partially can well, I think it's
partially a metaphor capitalism for capitalism and partially starting with
(03:53):
a George or Merrow. Um. But but partially they're kind
of inexpensive filming location. That's true. But I will say
that a large number of my nightmares take place in
shopping malls. Yeah, all the time. In my dreams, I'd
be I'd be straight shopping and shopping the nightmare part.
(04:15):
It can be both, It can be either both. Usually
it's both. Oh gosh, speak into your psyche. I know, right,
I have said too much. Um. Producer Casey and I
were in South Africa over New Year's and like everything
was abandoned. It wasn't abandoned, but it felt very empty.
And the people that I met there said that a
(04:36):
lot of people go on vacation during that so it's
kind of an emptier city. So I just remember being
with Casey and wandering around a mall that had nobody
in it and thinking, this is we can find the exit?
Oh no, oh yeah, And then you just hear the
lone pair of shoes coming like walking down the escalator.
(05:00):
That sound. Oh my god, the mist starts creeping in
my heart is beating heart. This episode will not be
entirely creeping, although now that I think about it. It
is interesting the stranger things is in the mall. But
there's a couple of reasons for that. I would guess, Um,
when I was in middle slash high school, I hung
(05:21):
out a decent amountain food courts. Yeah. Us both being
children of the eighties and or nineties, I would say
that's a pretty common experience. Yeah, and for me, that's
looking back, that's very bizarre because to get to a
food court was like an hour drive. There was no
mall around me. Yeah, but I did it a still
North Point mall. Um. I typically went to Anti Ant's
(05:42):
Pretzels and I got the honey Galay sauce that's my favorite.
Um strawberry smoothie, Chinese food and or Hogan Nahs with
the Mountain Rocky Mountain Road favorite. My mom always got
a farmer's basket or euro Oh I'm not sure that
I know what farmer's basket is. It's just like potato,
I mean potatoes. Yeah. Sure. Uh. Coral Square Mall for forever.
(06:05):
Anyone who's familiar with the South Florida Coral Coral Springs area,
that was my mall growing up. Um Uh. When I
went with my grandmother, we would always get an anti
Ane's a cinnamon and sugar classic. Um. Sometimes we would
go to the mall just to get take out from
the Japanese teppanyaki place. Yeah, my grandmother loved it. Um uhs.
(06:28):
And as a teen, I would usually get some kind
of a bourbon chicken from whichever stall was selling it,
because I feel like in the nineties, like every stall,
no matter what cuisine they were selling, had just bourbon chicken.
Yeah it's not a free bourbon chicken. Samples, oh it
was my favorite. Or a blizzard from Dairy Queen or
smoothie once those started happening. Um, I still get a
(06:49):
pang of nostalgia whenever I see an Orange Julius. Yeah,
I I don't know that I've ever had Orange Julius
outside of the pre sample. The smoothie that I got
was from a different place, a competitor. Oh no, yes,
smoothie competition. But okay, okay, all of this thanks her questions. Yes,
(07:12):
food courts, what are they? Well, a food court is
a group of booths or stalls, each selling different food
and drink within a larger structure, and again, mostly for
the purposes of this episode, the larger structure we're talking
about is a shopping mall, which is itself a group
of shops, each selling different wares within a larger structure.
(07:36):
Whoas recursive right word iterative? Sure. Yeah. The space allotted
to food court restaurants is truncated. The storefront is usually
quite small, just a register and either a work counter
or like a staff served buffet your customer, seating and
restrooms and all the utilities other practicalities for those restaurants
(08:00):
in a food court is often completely communal and managed
by the by the mall building management. Yes, and in
my particular food court there was a merry go round. Goodness, Okay,
it's fancy, It's very fancy. I never got the right
What was I doing? What were you doing? I'm going
(08:23):
to fix this. You're eating Rocky Mountain Road. I knew
what was important, you did, you had priorities. The kitchens
for these establishments are typically hidden back behind um the storefronts.
Walls UM are kind of like splash splash walls, and
depending on the kitchen space, the food might be prepped
(08:43):
or part cooked, or cooked entirely at a larger, perhaps
central locations, and then reheated in store. In modern or
arguably postmodern capitalist commerce. The shops and restaurants selling stuff
in malls are are mostly branches or franchises of national
or international chains. Independent vendors are much less frequent. Restaurants
(09:06):
and mall food courts have traditionally been fast food or
at least like pre prepared and ready to box and go.
And for yeah, like a long time that the slowest
food you could possibly get into food court was a
sandwich built speck. And because we humans like commerce, UM,
A lot of theory and research has been written up
(09:29):
about malls and food courts. If you're into that sort
of thing, it is so fascinating. I went down rabbit holes. Um. Yeah.
Malls are are again like kind of postmodern lee characterized
as theatrical and hyper real UM intended to provoke customer excitement.
(09:49):
Intricate study is done into UM animating customers within and
among stores, and into orchestrating the shopping experience UM as
a as a leisure experience rather than as a chore. Yeah,
and food, of course is UH is central to that
perhaps of course often literally central. The food court is
(10:10):
off at the very center of the mall. M because
you've got to get to it. You've got to go
through all that's how it is. Gotta pass the Hot
Topic and the Forever twenty one and the Spencers and
by then, yeah, at all this stuff. You don't know
why or how. Yeah, but but you've worked up a
hunger and you have to walk past all those stores
(10:33):
again on your way back. If there was something you
were thinking about that you didn't buy the first time,
you've got another opportunity. It's true. There was a big
hubbub a couple of years ago because um, this I
would say fancier mall called Avalon opened on Exit tin
and North Point Mall is Exit nine. Oh goodness, it's
a direct competition, and everyone was like so excited about Avalon.
(10:57):
It's gonna be so fancy, has like um big restaurants
in Atlanta, Bacata Burger and um Antikos. They have restaurants
at Avalon. And my mom and I go to north
Point Mall every year for Black Friday. And I've seen J. C.
Penny try so hard to do what you just said,
(11:18):
like via leisure destination. They put like weird couches in
the middle, and like I've had things that you could
play with and there's like coffee you could get like
in the middle of the clothes. Yeah. Yeah, more more
shops or more department stores. I've seen like like having
like a Starbucks like in yeah the store, and I'm
(11:41):
just like, goodness, Yeah, there's Okay. The most recent research
that I read about this isn't super reseent. It's from
maybe like twenty eleven or so, and people were saying
that the average time spent in a shopping center was
I believe eighty four minutes and uh, and so they
were they were looking for any way to stretch that. Yeah,
(12:03):
because the longer you got them hypothetically, Yeah, and and
just yet to make it to make it a chill vibe,
a chill but somehow pressing vibe. It's very interesting. Yeah, okay, uh,
some some some numbers, yes, and we'll have some sprinkled throughout.
(12:28):
But here's a few. Between nine and two thousand five,
the US built hundred malls, okay, yeah, and the US
has about one eight food halls, which will get into
more later. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and research shows that shoppers
at malls with a solid food court like decent options
spend up to more just in general. So yeah, it's
(12:53):
important numbers prove it out. They do. And culturally, I
would say the beginning of the eighties, malls and the
food courts represented teenage. That was our version of teenage freedom,
which is a little bit borked when you think about it. Indeed.
(13:14):
I mean the car was like the teenage freedom of
the nineteen fifties and sixties, right, And we were like,
let's go shopping, let's go hang out at the mall
and slowly and does that's what we were doing and
then maybe go into hot topic. Maybe malls that still
had video game arcades. Those were the very best balls,
(13:37):
hard to find by the time, by the time, like
the mid to late nineties world around. But you know,
I actually got banned from an arcade because I kept winning, Lauren.
I was good at the Claw, and if you did
the Claw, you've got two hundred tickets. And I would
just get all the two hundred tickets until there were
no more and they'd be like, you're not welcome here
(13:58):
ever again. Oh well, it wasn't ever again. It was
like I just just dang, I don't know, I figured
something out, uh, But it did epitomize the teen experiences.
It's what you did um, specifically in the suburbs. Yes, yes, yes, um.
(14:20):
And while food courts may maybe a bit of a
relic becoming relicky, that's what a lot of articles I
remember when this idea first caught my attention. This because
stuff you should know. Our fellow podcast they did one
on like the death of the mall food court, and
I was like, I want to know all about this. Um,
the trendier, more expensive cousin of the food court, the
(14:43):
food hall is on their eyes, and there is one
in this very building. Yes, yes, we technically work above
them all. We technically do. Yes. But this brings us
to some history. Yes, but first it brings us to
a quick break for word from our sponsor, and we're back.
(15:10):
Thank you sponsored, Yes, thank you. Food courts have been
around a good while. It turns out malls have been
around for a good while in one form or another.
Centers of commerce perhaps um. Ancient Greece had the Agora
places of assembly that served both as community spaces and
commercial spaces, lots of stalls and vendors, stuff like that.
(15:32):
It's also where the word uh agoraphobia comes from. Really
in second century CE, and for Trajan commissioned to the
construction of Trajan's Market, and this market was built next
to a hill and at some sections reached six stories.
And while don't have a food court per se, I'm
fairly certain in historians whose word you can trust more
(15:53):
than mine perhaps are fairly certain that some kind of
food was available there. One of the first food courts
was over five hundred years back to Issembul's Grand Bazaar.
Thousands thousands of specialty shops kebab sweet spices still in operation.
By the sixteen hundreds, major cities in Europe had one
(16:13):
or two story buildings devoted to multiple indoor kiosks and shops,
some of which would have sold food and shopping. Arcades
were popular around Europe during the early eighteen hundreds, and
these were a little bit more formalized, a little bit fancier. Uh.
I was very confused when I went to Rudding, England
and and saw an arcade advertise, because I was like,
(16:34):
that's that's a large that's a large place for video
games in the middle of this kind of middle of
nowhere town. I had the same confusion. Definitely, definitely a
shopping arcade, not a video arcade. Still delightful, Yeah, for sure,
I had, um, what I think is now an adorably
naive thought. I thought Piccadilly Circus was a circus I
(16:56):
was going to see, like the circus I've never been.
Oh my god. It was like, yes, I'm gonna get out.
It's gonna be a big time that I wandered around, like,
where's the circus? Oh, young Andy? Perfect kind of related
(17:16):
all this in four Charles Henry Harrod and yes that
Herod opened a grocery and t shop and it was very,
very small, but not very small for long. It flourished
and grew into Herod's department store Omnia omnibus que. Their
slogan goes everything for everyone, everywhere. I went to that
last time I was in London, and it is a lot.
(17:38):
It is a lot. Boston's Quincy Market got it start
in Philadelphia's Reading Terminal Market in eight and Seattle's Pike
Place in nineteen o seven. The early nineteen hundreds is
when the mall started to dominate in downtown USA. These
were places women could go out in lunch, like women
(18:03):
in public. Don't worry, Annie, I'm worried. I'm worried. Um.
There's the Walnut Room, which is a very famous dining
room above a tiffany dome. Um. And at the time,
these fancy white tablecloth restaurants were all the rage in
(18:23):
these kind of early mall food corps um. But there
was a shift and a shift to cheaper, faster options.
One of the things that precipitated this change was the
post World War two migration of Americans into suburbia. A
nine article from The Times called Flight to Suburbia put
(18:44):
the number of shopping malls at ninety three, with twenty
five more in progress. Almost all of them had dining options.
Cafeterias like Morrison's or wool Worse five and dime became
the thing, the elusive thing, um. And I can see
this reflected to my dad, who loved going to cafeterias,
(19:05):
even though I really did not like it. And it
wasn't because of the food, but because of the stress
I felt it carrying the tree. Oh oh, it could
topple at any moment, because you've got your balance of
water and all your dessert and your oh, your salad.
It's too much anyway. Um. The first shopping mall in
(19:26):
the United States was Southdale Center in Adena, which is
a suburb outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and it was designed
by a Viennese socialist architect by the name of Victor Gruen,
who had fled Europe in eight uh fleeing from from
the Nazis, and made his business in America designing boutique
shops and department stores, and then this mall in nineteen
(19:49):
fifty six. It was a two story structure. It still
is a two story structure with with room for a
few dozen shops to to anchor department stores wanted either
end and and the space of those shops opened up
into a shared inner courtyard. And it was all covered
by a roof temperature control throughout the entire building, and
(20:10):
of course escalators up and down, one on either side
of them. All. Yeah. It contained not a food court
as such, but but cafes around the courtyard, which grew
in called the garden Court of Perpetual Spring. This this
guy had ideas and they were beautifully, beautifully expressed. Um.
(20:31):
He was hoping to revitalize this post war suburb into
like a like a walkable community kind of space. Uh.
He called suburbs avenues of horror, flanked by the greatest
collection of vulgarity billboards motels, gas stations, shanties, car lots,
miscellaneous industrial equipment, hot dog stands, wayside stores ever collected
(20:58):
by mankind not hot dog stands. Ah and yeah, Gruin's mall,
the Southdale Center is basically where humanity got the blueprint
for the mall as we know it um. And then,
of course Americans went and surrounded them by parking lots
(21:19):
and motels and gas stations and wayside stores, hot dog stands,
hot dog stands, and poor poor Gruin. By by night
he was so fed up with America's take on his
design that he said, I would like to take this
opportunity to disclaim paternity once and for all. I refused
to pay alimony to those bastard developments. They destroyed our cities.
(21:43):
Who whoa, He was mad about it. I think that's fair.
I'd be like, yeah, okay, all right, yeah, sorry out.
When it comes to the first successful mall food court,
(22:04):
there are two contenders, Toronto's Shoreway Gardens and New Jersey's
paramous mall. Both or the brainchild of James W. Rouse.
And he was leading the charge when it came to
mall development, and he frequently gets the credit for coining
shopping mall in the fifties. His dream was create community centers,
(22:25):
places where people could gather. Columbia, Maryland. The city was
based on his ideas around community design. Oh yeah yeah,
grew in designed to the plans for a few cities
throughout America. Fresno is the one that's coming to mind anyway.
Decades later, Rouse went on to spearhead urban renewal projects
(22:45):
and as the generation of kids who moved out to
the suburbs grew up and had their own children in
the seventies and eighties, those kids grew up near malls.
The mall was a cultural centerpiece. UM, the source of
board games, game shows, concert tours. UM. Britney Spears in
part got started this way. I have a friend who
(23:06):
told me he saw Miley Syres before she was big
at North Point Ball. But I don't know that's true. Um,
why would you lie though? Anyway? Eight two film Fast
Times at Ridgemont High. Did you ever play the board
game Mall Madness? I did not? Oh, this was okay.
So there were two two versions that I have witnessed. UM.
The earlier version was was a board game where you
(23:28):
were at a mall and like the goal was to
collect certain types of stuff from different stores as you
moved around the board. And uh, the the new fancy
version that I that I really covet it, even though
I didn't really enjoy playing the game. UM had had
this digital digital component where like you, each player had
a had a little credit card and the in the
(23:49):
board had like a little thing that you would stick
the credit card into and it would tell you stuff.
I don't know, a little digital voice. I don't remember
what it said. It's probably really a fun se. Maybe
maybe it was just criticizing your shopping choices. Oh well, no,
not offensive like that. It was probably just like, isn't
shopping the best for girls? Because girls love shopping and stuff.
(24:12):
That's probably exactly what it said. You are spot. Yeah,
I didn't know. I am a board game human. I
love playing board games. And when I was doing the
research and they had just this list of board games
based on shopping, I was kind of taken aback that
I had not heard of them. Wow. Yeah, UM one
(24:34):
of the staples that emerged around this time in terms
of small restaurant fare, not in terms of board games. Yes,
although that could have happened as well, And I don't know.
UM is a go to that is still around, and
it is orange Julius, orange juice and a few choice ingredients.
As the slogan went, they hand out for examples, like
(24:55):
we talked about UM. On the West Coast, another staple
emerged hot Dogs on a stick, which specialized in corn
dogs and lemonade, frequently served by women adorned in like
really brightly striped mini dresses and hats. Other heavy hitter
ethnic choices emerged around this time, like Panda Express. Sabarrow,
which too much shame is the first pizza I ever
(25:16):
had in New York City. Sorry, the first Sabarrow opened
in nineteen fifty six, by the way, and the first
moll Ocation opened in nineteen seventy, And I went on
such a Sabarrow rabbit hole. They have this whole pizza
pizza centric model to modernize. Oh that's that's good. I'm
glad if they're going pizza centric, that's good for them.
(25:38):
Pizza centric is a fun word. Is that I feel
like I am pizza centric? This is another T shirt idea,
so many T shirt ideas. Then along came the cookie trend,
which we talked about a little bit in our chocolate
chip cookie episode, The Great American Cookie Company, Mrs Fields,
the cookie Cake, Oh yes, the cookie cake. The success
(26:00):
of the mall food court rippled out into other sectors,
especially those involving feeding large groups of people, like college campuses.
A lot of them switched from a more dining hall
type setup um to a more food court type situation,
sometimes featuring big names like Taco Bell and Pizza Huts.
And I bring those two up because they are popular options,
(26:23):
but also because there are some Atlanta lure around those two,
specifically from my alma mater, Georgia Tech, because being in Atlanta,
I believe this is the story. We were told they
are the only ones of those franchises to serve Coca
Cola and not Pepsi because the parent company is Pepsi, Yes,
or the same company anyway, Yes, um, but being Coca
(26:46):
Cola is like right across the street, they say no
serving Coca Cola here, and I think there's a deal,
like there's some kind of contract with Georgia Tech showing
about Coca Cola and everyone knows. I love a very
ring legal dramas, so I find it fascinating. Airports shifted
this way as well. Towards a more food court type design,
(27:09):
and so did hospitals, And to this day blows my
mind when I see McDonald's in hospital, I was like,
where am I right? Yeah, it's very strange, very bizarre.
The innual face eighties vibe of malls really didn't job
with the grungy sensibilities of the nineties. Oh they tried it,
tried so hard, They tried so hard. Mall started to
(27:30):
try to be more adult, adding in casual, sit down
restaurants like Cheesecake Factory. And this was a big thing.
When I got all over, my parents wanted me to
meet them at the Cheesecake Factory at North Point Mall
and California Pizza Kitchen. That's another big one. In the film,
Scenes from a Mall with Bette Midler and Woody Allen
largely featured, so Coyle's Mall the Beverly Center. By the way,
(27:52):
nineteen was peak mall in America. Nineteen malls opened in
the United States that year. And speaking of Pete Mall,
it is time for the Mary Kate Nashley factor of
the episode. In a glorious event in mall food court history,
Minneapolis opened the mall of America, the world's largest mall
(28:18):
for food courts for an amusement park in Aquarium, the
centerpiece of Mary Kate and Ashley Adventure. Malls were at
their highest point, but as they flew too close to
the sun or too close to the Internet, because this
marked when people started moving to shopping on the recession,
(28:39):
did not help. No no, no, no no UM and
Yes malls then and now are in general and trouble.
UM anchor stores, those big department stores like Sears and
Macy's are drawing fewer consumers. Many have been forced to
close up shop with those draws. Dead food courts, which
depend largely on foot traffic and impulse purchasing, our suffering
(29:01):
as well. In two thousand, three of Cinnamon stores were
in trouble. Dippin Dots filed for bankruptcy Circle Sabarrow was
looking for bankruptcy protection as Johnba Juice closed twenty two
stores in New York and Chicago alone. Uh malls began
renovating their food courts, making them bright and shiny, putting
(29:24):
in merry grounds um hoping to stem the loss of
foot traffic, and some mainstays have switched focus, like a
Panda Express now operates largely standalone stores like of their
stores are stand alone as of UM. The aforementioned Cinnamon
and John B Juice and Dipping Dots. I believe are
(29:44):
opening kiosks in amusement parks and airports on college campuses,
stuff like that. Yes, there's a Panda Express in six
flags over Georgia. Oh, there you go. That's success. Have
I never heard it? But the concept was dead. It
matured into food halls involved shifted. Yes, these are I
(30:10):
guess fancier, more expensive and trinity for sure versions of
small food courts. They typically have a market aspect as
in each of the restaurants have to have a market
where you can buy things like spices or here it's
mostly like spices, or like dishware, olive oil. Yeah, things
(30:31):
like that. UM. Celebrity chefs might be involved and leading
the charge was Etaly, a food hall opened in old
Italian Vermouth factory in two thousand and seven and it
now has several locations. From food halls are expected to
triple from seen there was a seven increase in food
(30:51):
halls who UM. As of the third financial quarter of
there were ninety six major food hall projects in the
United States. With an additional thirty five slated to open
in the fourth quarter. Wow. Yeah. Interesting thing about these
um is a lot of them are revitalized abandoned malls,
especially Sears and Roebuck. It seems that's true for our
(31:13):
home food. Yeah we we are. We are in an
old Sears and Roebuck building. Yes we are, Yes we are.
And I've seen food halls described as millennial, post industrial urban,
and I would say it reflects a larger shift to
this food to table local is better idea. And I'm
not necessarily saying that it's what's happening. I think that's
just kind of the mindset. Yeah. And also foodism, the
(31:38):
food is often the draw as opposed to something to
fuel your need for shopping in your shopping spree. An
article from Box claims has to do with our desire
for quote authenticity. Yeah. A lot of the food concepts
at food halls are are independent ones, local local chefs,
local stuff. Yes, and for chefs from what I've read,
it does remove the startup cost um and usually ensures
(32:01):
a certain amount of foot traffic. And because of this,
they are frequently treated as incubators. Are like a way
to try a new new concept, new idea. Um, and
I have been. I think that maybe the last time
I went to New York. No, no, because we went recently.
But the time before that, I went to New York's
Chelsea Market, which is our home food hall is designed
(32:25):
based on that one, right, yeah, the same property owners
Jamestown also designed to Chelsea Market, and they also have
a newer one in New York called the Cab, I think,
and I went to that one and it was fact wow,
I waited in line a long time for some good
ice cream. M hm, yes, and I have my confession
(32:46):
is one of my favorite lame tourist things to do
when in New York City is to get a drink
in Grand Central Station and people watch, which has its
own like food court thing. Yeah, oh hey, that's people
watching is a wonderful spectator sport, it is. And malls
and food courts they are their high quality. Every time
(33:11):
I forget, because if we're like in an office, and
I always forget when I go downstairs randomly for something
that there is a mall below was and it's going
to be populated with people who are shopping there. Yeah yeah, yeah, um,
it's a it's it's it's a very it's very strange.
(33:31):
The whole uh post postmodern concept of live work play
of is very odd to me. Um. I my two
of my very dear friends once wrote the book and
lyrics for a Plane, which the main struggle was crampus
versus h shopping kind of um and one of one
(33:56):
of the lines in it that that stuck with me
was was this this very millennial character going, I always
wanted to live in a mall growing up, and now
I can. Yeah. Oh man, I feel like there's a
lot of stuff to unpack. Oh yeah, when it comes
to the mall. That's why there's so many horror things
(34:17):
based around it. Yeah, cramps one in the play. If
you're wondering, I figured, I figured. Um. But that about
brings us to the end of this episode. But we
do have a little bit more for you. But first
we have one more quick weak for a word from
our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you,
(34:46):
and we're back with I didn't follow you on that one,
but I but I liked it. Yeah, it's hard to
do the stranger things. Oh words isn't fit. Yeah, but
I eighties sound in in general is hard. To accomplish
(35:07):
without since and I have not mastered that yet. Well,
another thing that I look forward to you working on
I'll put on my list. William shat your impression. That's
those are my goals. That's it, yep, Kate Rope, I
just finished listening to the Watermelon episode. In the middle
(35:27):
of it, I froze because you mentioned someone I know,
Slaughtermelon from Middle Georgia, Derby Demon Slaughter, who goes by
Lonnie when not on the track, is a longtime friend
and exactly as cool a person as you'd expect with
a name like that. But more to the point, I'm
running to answer Anne's hope she does, in fact or
one of those watermelon helmets. Yes, and she messages on
(35:47):
Facebook and she has like watermelon leggings to best Oh Van,
thank you Lonnie. Yeah, that's that's wonderful. That is so cool.
We were hoping somehow the word would get to you.
It's a small world, and that is delightful. Heck Sean wrote,
(36:08):
just finished the Chuck E Cheese episode and was a
little disappointed you didn't mention the Tim Wilson at Lanta
native now deceased song Chuck E Cheese Hell. Tim was
a Southern comedian who wrote many parody and original songs
to go along with his act. Many of them are
of actual events which may occur in the South, such
as the fistfight at a Southern Baptist church softball game. However,
(36:30):
Chuck E Cheese Hell is about everything y'all discussed in
the episode. I hope you will look it up on
YouTube and watch it if you haven't or weren't aware
of the song that sounds right up for Ali. Yeah,
Oh I haven't. I haven't opened it yet, but we will.
We will. Yeah, thank you. Yeah. No, anytime that there's
a parody song attached to something that we've covered, please
(36:53):
let us know. Yes, I on Sunday, I saw a
weird now in concert. Oh you did? It's great, Yeah,
and I had a very wonderful time. I'm a big
fan of parity songs. So yes, anytime, anytime. But in
the meantime, thanks to both of them for writing to us.
(37:14):
If you would like to write to us, you can.
Our email is Hello at saborpod dot com. We're also
on social media. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook,
and Twitter at savor pod. We do hope to hear
from you. Savor is a production of I heart Radio
and Stuff Media. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,
you can visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
(37:35):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thank you
as always to our superproducers Dylan Vagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
Hello, and welcome to save our protection. If I hear
radio and Steph Media, I'm any and I'm Lauren voge olbam.
And today we're talking about the food court. Yeah, the
food court, that one, the single food court, Like you
all know which one we're talking about, enough said, right right,
heavy wink. Mall food courts and food holes similar, yeah, yeah,
(00:32):
kind of kind of extrapolating out from there, but yeah,
mostly mall food courts. Yes, And this was an idea
that we had based on the new season of Stranger Things,
um which heavily features a mall food court. Yes. And
I believe since Stranger Things is filmed here in Atlanta,
where we also record our media, that's true. Hum. We
(00:56):
were just discussing that. I believe this was filmed at
the the original, the original mall that that I attended
here in Atlanta. I moved here like fourteen years ago,
and I moved like right right down the street from
the North Decam mall. And I think I believe that's
the one. I like. I like that in your universe
that is the original mall, the original I'll be defined
(01:19):
around the mall that you my original. I like it.
I like it's like a timeline thing. Um yeah, I
I I was saying that if anyone doesn't know about
North decap and they're in the Atlanta area, very cheap
movie tickets. Oh yeah, yeah, great for that really cheap. Yes,
And I as we record this tomorrow is the fourth
(01:42):
of July, and I will be running a race and
very unhappy about it. But then I'm gonna go home,
I'm gonna crash and I'm gonna watch things. Oh well, see,
that's that's delightful. Hopefully, hopefully you're going to do great
in your race, and the stranger things part will be
(02:03):
will hopefully be delightful. Just pretend I have those monsters
racing behind me. That is fine. And there's that Zombies
run app which is great. Yeah. And we recently spent
a lot of time in a mall food court a
decent amount of chime in Hawaii. Um shier kia, which
is a Japanese walk Yes, uh yeah, it's it's a
(02:24):
it's a yokocho, which is a type of a Japanese
concept of a food court within a mall situation. And
it was delightful. As we went back twice. We we did. Yeah,
we ate so much there, so much of it was
so card heavy and it was everything was beautiful. It
was it was um yea. And we went to another
(02:45):
one in Hawaii to we didn't spend as much time
in that one, but we went to another chese yeah. Um.
And speaking of I have been to food courts in
Japan and China and they have blown my friaking minds. Yeah. Wow,
they seem from from my experiences in Hawaii, Uh, they
seem to be much much larger and more hectic and
(03:08):
more alcohol based, yes, than what you consider when what
you typically think of, I think yeah, and when the
ones I'm thinking of, there are a lot more options.
There's so many options for everything. Yeah, you want bubble
t there's like fifteen types you want stir fry types
like yeah, sure, it's a lot going on. And also
(03:32):
Lauren and I have both agreed that thanks to Silent Hill,
a few things are as frightening as an abandoned mall
in the food courts involved in that. Yeah, a lot
of a lot of scary movies take place and closed
are abandoned malls. I'm partially can well, I think it's
partially a metaphor capitalism for capitalism and partially starting with
(03:53):
a George or Merrow. Um. But but partially they're kind
of inexpensive filming location. That's true. But I will say
that a large number of my nightmares take place in
shopping malls. Yeah, all the time. In my dreams, I'd
be I'd be straight shopping and shopping the nightmare part.
(04:15):
It can be both, It can be either both. Usually
it's both. Oh gosh, speak into your psyche. I know, right,
I have said too much. Um. Producer Casey and I
were in South Africa over New Year's and like everything
was abandoned. It wasn't abandoned, but it felt very empty.
And the people that I met there said that a
(04:36):
lot of people go on vacation during that so it's
kind of an emptier city. So I just remember being
with Casey and wandering around a mall that had nobody
in it and thinking, this is we can find the exit?
Oh no, oh yeah, And then you just hear the
lone pair of shoes coming like walking down the escalator.
(05:00):
That sound. Oh my god, the mist starts creeping in
my heart is beating heart. This episode will not be
entirely creeping, although now that I think about it. It
is interesting the stranger things is in the mall. But
there's a couple of reasons for that. I would guess, Um,
when I was in middle slash high school, I hung
(05:21):
out a decent amountain food courts. Yeah. Us both being
children of the eighties and or nineties, I would say
that's a pretty common experience. Yeah, and for me, that's
looking back, that's very bizarre because to get to a
food court was like an hour drive. There was no
mall around me. Yeah, but I did it a still
North Point mall. Um. I typically went to Anti Ant's
(05:42):
Pretzels and I got the honey Galay sauce that's my favorite.
Um strawberry smoothie, Chinese food and or Hogan Nahs with
the Mountain Rocky Mountain Road favorite. My mom always got
a farmer's basket or euro Oh I'm not sure that
I know what farmer's basket is. It's just like potato,
I mean potatoes. Yeah. Sure. Uh. Coral Square Mall for forever.
(06:05):
Anyone who's familiar with the South Florida Coral Coral Springs area,
that was my mall growing up. Um Uh. When I
went with my grandmother, we would always get an anti
Ane's a cinnamon and sugar classic. Um. Sometimes we would
go to the mall just to get take out from
the Japanese teppanyaki place. Yeah, my grandmother loved it. Um uhs.
(06:28):
And as a teen, I would usually get some kind
of a bourbon chicken from whichever stall was selling it,
because I feel like in the nineties, like every stall,
no matter what cuisine they were selling, had just bourbon chicken.
Yeah it's not a free bourbon chicken. Samples, oh it
was my favorite. Or a blizzard from Dairy Queen or
smoothie once those started happening. Um, I still get a
(06:49):
pang of nostalgia whenever I see an Orange Julius. Yeah,
I I don't know that I've ever had Orange Julius
outside of the pre sample. The smoothie that I got
was from a different place, a competitor. Oh no, yes,
smoothie competition. But okay, okay, all of this thanks her questions. Yes,
(07:12):
food courts, what are they? Well, a food court is
a group of booths or stalls, each selling different food
and drink within a larger structure, and again, mostly for
the purposes of this episode, the larger structure we're talking
about is a shopping mall, which is itself a group
of shops, each selling different wares within a larger structure.
(07:36):
Whoas recursive right word iterative? Sure. Yeah. The space allotted
to food court restaurants is truncated. The storefront is usually
quite small, just a register and either a work counter
or like a staff served buffet your customer, seating and
restrooms and all the utilities other practicalities for those restaurants
(08:00):
in a food court is often completely communal and managed
by the by the mall building management. Yes, and in
my particular food court there was a merry go round. Goodness, Okay,
it's fancy, It's very fancy. I never got the right
What was I doing? What were you doing? I'm going
(08:23):
to fix this. You're eating Rocky Mountain Road. I knew
what was important, you did, you had priorities. The kitchens
for these establishments are typically hidden back behind um the storefronts.
Walls UM are kind of like splash splash walls, and
depending on the kitchen space, the food might be prepped
(08:43):
or part cooked, or cooked entirely at a larger, perhaps
central locations, and then reheated in store. In modern or
arguably postmodern capitalist commerce. The shops and restaurants selling stuff
in malls are are mostly branches or franchises of national
or international chains. Independent vendors are much less frequent. Restaurants
(09:06):
and mall food courts have traditionally been fast food or
at least like pre prepared and ready to box and go.
And for yeah, like a long time that the slowest
food you could possibly get into food court was a
sandwich built speck. And because we humans like commerce, UM,
A lot of theory and research has been written up
(09:29):
about malls and food courts. If you're into that sort
of thing, it is so fascinating. I went down rabbit holes. Um. Yeah.
Malls are are again like kind of postmodern lee characterized
as theatrical and hyper real UM intended to provoke customer excitement.
(09:49):
Intricate study is done into UM animating customers within and
among stores, and into orchestrating the shopping experience UM as
a as a leisure experience rather than as a chore. Yeah,
and food, of course is UH is central to that
perhaps of course often literally central. The food court is
(10:10):
off at the very center of the mall. M because
you've got to get to it. You've got to go
through all that's how it is. Gotta pass the Hot
Topic and the Forever twenty one and the Spencers and
by then, yeah, at all this stuff. You don't know
why or how. Yeah, but but you've worked up a
hunger and you have to walk past all those stores
(10:33):
again on your way back. If there was something you
were thinking about that you didn't buy the first time,
you've got another opportunity. It's true. There was a big
hubbub a couple of years ago because um, this I
would say fancier mall called Avalon opened on Exit tin
and North Point Mall is Exit nine. Oh goodness, it's
a direct competition, and everyone was like so excited about Avalon.
(10:57):
It's gonna be so fancy, has like um big restaurants
in Atlanta, Bacata Burger and um Antikos. They have restaurants
at Avalon. And my mom and I go to north
Point Mall every year for Black Friday. And I've seen J. C.
Penny try so hard to do what you just said,
(11:18):
like via leisure destination. They put like weird couches in
the middle, and like I've had things that you could
play with and there's like coffee you could get like
in the middle of the clothes. Yeah. Yeah, more more
shops or more department stores. I've seen like like having
like a Starbucks like in yeah the store, and I'm
(11:41):
just like, goodness, Yeah, there's Okay. The most recent research
that I read about this isn't super reseent. It's from
maybe like twenty eleven or so, and people were saying
that the average time spent in a shopping center was
I believe eighty four minutes and uh, and so they
were they were looking for any way to stretch that. Yeah,
(12:03):
because the longer you got them hypothetically, Yeah, and and
just yet to make it to make it a chill vibe,
a chill but somehow pressing vibe. It's very interesting. Yeah, okay, uh,
some some some numbers, yes, and we'll have some sprinkled throughout.
(12:28):
But here's a few. Between nine and two thousand five,
the US built hundred malls, okay, yeah, and the US
has about one eight food halls, which will get into
more later. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and research shows that shoppers
at malls with a solid food court like decent options
spend up to more just in general. So yeah, it's
(12:53):
important numbers prove it out. They do. And culturally, I
would say the beginning of the eighties, malls and the
food courts represented teenage. That was our version of teenage freedom,
which is a little bit borked when you think about it. Indeed.
(13:14):
I mean the car was like the teenage freedom of
the nineteen fifties and sixties, right, And we were like,
let's go shopping, let's go hang out at the mall
and slowly and does that's what we were doing and
then maybe go into hot topic. Maybe malls that still
had video game arcades. Those were the very best balls,
(13:37):
hard to find by the time, by the time, like
the mid to late nineties world around. But you know,
I actually got banned from an arcade because I kept winning, Lauren.
I was good at the Claw, and if you did
the Claw, you've got two hundred tickets. And I would
just get all the two hundred tickets until there were
no more and they'd be like, you're not welcome here
(13:58):
ever again. Oh well, it wasn't ever again. It was
like I just just dang, I don't know, I figured
something out, uh, But it did epitomize the teen experiences.
It's what you did um, specifically in the suburbs. Yes, yes, yes, um.
(14:20):
And while food courts may maybe a bit of a
relic becoming relicky, that's what a lot of articles I
remember when this idea first caught my attention. This because
stuff you should know. Our fellow podcast they did one
on like the death of the mall food court, and
I was like, I want to know all about this. Um,
the trendier, more expensive cousin of the food court, the
(14:43):
food hall is on their eyes, and there is one
in this very building. Yes, yes, we technically work above
them all. We technically do. Yes. But this brings us
to some history. Yes, but first it brings us to
a quick break for word from our sponsor, and we're back.
(15:10):
Thank you sponsored, Yes, thank you. Food courts have been
around a good while. It turns out malls have been
around for a good while in one form or another.
Centers of commerce perhaps um. Ancient Greece had the Agora
places of assembly that served both as community spaces and
commercial spaces, lots of stalls and vendors, stuff like that.
(15:32):
It's also where the word uh agoraphobia comes from. Really
in second century CE, and for Trajan commissioned to the
construction of Trajan's Market, and this market was built next
to a hill and at some sections reached six stories.
And while don't have a food court per se, I'm
fairly certain in historians whose word you can trust more
(15:53):
than mine perhaps are fairly certain that some kind of
food was available there. One of the first food courts
was over five hundred years back to Issembul's Grand Bazaar.
Thousands thousands of specialty shops kebab sweet spices still in operation.
By the sixteen hundreds, major cities in Europe had one
(16:13):
or two story buildings devoted to multiple indoor kiosks and shops,
some of which would have sold food and shopping. Arcades
were popular around Europe during the early eighteen hundreds, and
these were a little bit more formalized, a little bit fancier. Uh.
I was very confused when I went to Rudding, England
and and saw an arcade advertise, because I was like,
(16:34):
that's that's a large that's a large place for video
games in the middle of this kind of middle of
nowhere town. I had the same confusion. Definitely, definitely a
shopping arcade, not a video arcade. Still delightful, Yeah, for sure,
I had, um, what I think is now an adorably
naive thought. I thought Piccadilly Circus was a circus I
(16:56):
was going to see, like the circus I've never been.
Oh my god. It was like, yes, I'm gonna get out.
It's gonna be a big time that I wandered around, like,
where's the circus? Oh, young Andy? Perfect kind of related
(17:16):
all this in four Charles Henry Harrod and yes that
Herod opened a grocery and t shop and it was very,
very small, but not very small for long. It flourished
and grew into Herod's department store Omnia omnibus que. Their
slogan goes everything for everyone, everywhere. I went to that
last time I was in London, and it is a lot.
(17:38):
It is a lot. Boston's Quincy Market got it start
in Philadelphia's Reading Terminal Market in eight and Seattle's Pike
Place in nineteen o seven. The early nineteen hundreds is
when the mall started to dominate in downtown USA. These
were places women could go out in lunch, like women
(18:03):
in public. Don't worry, Annie, I'm worried. I'm worried. Um.
There's the Walnut Room, which is a very famous dining
room above a tiffany dome. Um. And at the time,
these fancy white tablecloth restaurants were all the rage in
(18:23):
these kind of early mall food corps um. But there
was a shift and a shift to cheaper, faster options.
One of the things that precipitated this change was the
post World War two migration of Americans into suburbia. A
nine article from The Times called Flight to Suburbia put
(18:44):
the number of shopping malls at ninety three, with twenty
five more in progress. Almost all of them had dining options.
Cafeterias like Morrison's or wool Worse five and dime became
the thing, the elusive thing, um. And I can see
this reflected to my dad, who loved going to cafeterias,
(19:05):
even though I really did not like it. And it
wasn't because of the food, but because of the stress
I felt it carrying the tree. Oh oh, it could
topple at any moment, because you've got your balance of
water and all your dessert and your oh, your salad.
It's too much anyway. Um. The first shopping mall in
(19:26):
the United States was Southdale Center in Adena, which is
a suburb outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota, and it was designed
by a Viennese socialist architect by the name of Victor Gruen,
who had fled Europe in eight uh fleeing from from
the Nazis, and made his business in America designing boutique
shops and department stores, and then this mall in nineteen
(19:49):
fifty six. It was a two story structure. It still
is a two story structure with with room for a
few dozen shops to to anchor department stores wanted either
end and and the space of those shops opened up
into a shared inner courtyard. And it was all covered
by a roof temperature control throughout the entire building, and
(20:10):
of course escalators up and down, one on either side
of them. All. Yeah. It contained not a food court
as such, but but cafes around the courtyard, which grew
in called the garden Court of Perpetual Spring. This this
guy had ideas and they were beautifully, beautifully expressed. Um.
(20:31):
He was hoping to revitalize this post war suburb into
like a like a walkable community kind of space. Uh.
He called suburbs avenues of horror, flanked by the greatest
collection of vulgarity billboards motels, gas stations, shanties, car lots,
miscellaneous industrial equipment, hot dog stands, wayside stores ever collected
(20:58):
by mankind not hot dog stands. Ah and yeah, Gruin's mall,
the Southdale Center is basically where humanity got the blueprint
for the mall as we know it um. And then,
of course Americans went and surrounded them by parking lots
(21:19):
and motels and gas stations and wayside stores, hot dog stands,
hot dog stands, and poor poor Gruin. By by night
he was so fed up with America's take on his
design that he said, I would like to take this
opportunity to disclaim paternity once and for all. I refused
to pay alimony to those bastard developments. They destroyed our cities.
(21:43):
Who whoa, He was mad about it. I think that's fair.
I'd be like, yeah, okay, all right, yeah, sorry out.
When it comes to the first successful mall food court,
(22:04):
there are two contenders, Toronto's Shoreway Gardens and New Jersey's
paramous mall. Both or the brainchild of James W. Rouse.
And he was leading the charge when it came to
mall development, and he frequently gets the credit for coining
shopping mall in the fifties. His dream was create community centers,
(22:25):
places where people could gather. Columbia, Maryland. The city was
based on his ideas around community design. Oh yeah yeah,
grew in designed to the plans for a few cities
throughout America. Fresno is the one that's coming to mind anyway.
Decades later, Rouse went on to spearhead urban renewal projects
(22:45):
and as the generation of kids who moved out to
the suburbs grew up and had their own children in
the seventies and eighties, those kids grew up near malls.
The mall was a cultural centerpiece. UM, the source of
board games, game shows, concert tours. UM. Britney Spears in
part got started this way. I have a friend who
(23:06):
told me he saw Miley Syres before she was big
at North Point Ball. But I don't know that's true. Um,
why would you lie though? Anyway? Eight two film Fast
Times at Ridgemont High. Did you ever play the board
game Mall Madness? I did not? Oh, this was okay.
So there were two two versions that I have witnessed. UM.
The earlier version was was a board game where you
(23:28):
were at a mall and like the goal was to
collect certain types of stuff from different stores as you
moved around the board. And uh, the the new fancy
version that I that I really covet it, even though
I didn't really enjoy playing the game. UM had had
this digital digital component where like you, each player had
a had a little credit card and the in the
(23:49):
board had like a little thing that you would stick
the credit card into and it would tell you stuff.
I don't know, a little digital voice. I don't remember
what it said. It's probably really a fun se. Maybe
maybe it was just criticizing your shopping choices. Oh well, no,
not offensive like that. It was probably just like, isn't
shopping the best for girls? Because girls love shopping and stuff.
(24:12):
That's probably exactly what it said. You are spot. Yeah,
I didn't know. I am a board game human. I
love playing board games. And when I was doing the
research and they had just this list of board games
based on shopping, I was kind of taken aback that
I had not heard of them. Wow. Yeah, UM one
(24:34):
of the staples that emerged around this time in terms
of small restaurant fare, not in terms of board games. Yes,
although that could have happened as well, And I don't know.
UM is a go to that is still around, and
it is orange Julius, orange juice and a few choice ingredients.
As the slogan went, they hand out for examples, like
(24:55):
we talked about UM. On the West Coast, another staple
emerged hot Dogs on a stick, which specialized in corn
dogs and lemonade, frequently served by women adorned in like
really brightly striped mini dresses and hats. Other heavy hitter
ethnic choices emerged around this time, like Panda Express. Sabarrow,
which too much shame is the first pizza I ever
(25:16):
had in New York City. Sorry, the first Sabarrow opened
in nineteen fifty six, by the way, and the first
moll Ocation opened in nineteen seventy, And I went on
such a Sabarrow rabbit hole. They have this whole pizza
pizza centric model to modernize. Oh that's that's good. I'm
glad if they're going pizza centric, that's good for them.
(25:38):
Pizza centric is a fun word. Is that I feel
like I am pizza centric? This is another T shirt idea,
so many T shirt ideas. Then along came the cookie trend,
which we talked about a little bit in our chocolate
chip cookie episode, The Great American Cookie Company, Mrs Fields,
the cookie Cake, Oh yes, the cookie cake. The success
(26:00):
of the mall food court rippled out into other sectors,
especially those involving feeding large groups of people, like college campuses.
A lot of them switched from a more dining hall
type setup um to a more food court type situation,
sometimes featuring big names like Taco Bell and Pizza Huts.
And I bring those two up because they are popular options,
(26:23):
but also because there are some Atlanta lure around those two,
specifically from my alma mater, Georgia Tech, because being in Atlanta,
I believe this is the story. We were told they
are the only ones of those franchises to serve Coca
Cola and not Pepsi because the parent company is Pepsi, Yes,
or the same company anyway, Yes, um, but being Coca
(26:46):
Cola is like right across the street, they say no
serving Coca Cola here, and I think there's a deal,
like there's some kind of contract with Georgia Tech showing
about Coca Cola and everyone knows. I love a very
ring legal dramas, so I find it fascinating. Airports shifted
this way as well. Towards a more food court type design,
(27:09):
and so did hospitals, And to this day blows my
mind when I see McDonald's in hospital, I was like,
where am I right? Yeah, it's very strange, very bizarre.
The innual face eighties vibe of malls really didn't job
with the grungy sensibilities of the nineties. Oh they tried it,
tried so hard, They tried so hard. Mall started to
(27:30):
try to be more adult, adding in casual, sit down
restaurants like Cheesecake Factory. And this was a big thing.
When I got all over, my parents wanted me to
meet them at the Cheesecake Factory at North Point Mall
and California Pizza Kitchen. That's another big one. In the film,
Scenes from a Mall with Bette Midler and Woody Allen
largely featured, so Coyle's Mall the Beverly Center. By the way,
(27:52):
nineteen was peak mall in America. Nineteen malls opened in
the United States that year. And speaking of Pete Mall,
it is time for the Mary Kate Nashley factor of
the episode. In a glorious event in mall food court history,
Minneapolis opened the mall of America, the world's largest mall
(28:18):
for food courts for an amusement park in Aquarium, the
centerpiece of Mary Kate and Ashley Adventure. Malls were at
their highest point, but as they flew too close to
the sun or too close to the Internet, because this
marked when people started moving to shopping on the recession,
(28:39):
did not help. No no, no, no no UM and
Yes malls then and now are in general and trouble.
UM anchor stores, those big department stores like Sears and
Macy's are drawing fewer consumers. Many have been forced to
close up shop with those draws. Dead food courts, which
depend largely on foot traffic and impulse purchasing, our suffering
(29:01):
as well. In two thousand, three of Cinnamon stores were
in trouble. Dippin Dots filed for bankruptcy Circle Sabarrow was
looking for bankruptcy protection as Johnba Juice closed twenty two
stores in New York and Chicago alone. Uh malls began
renovating their food courts, making them bright and shiny, putting
(29:24):
in merry grounds um hoping to stem the loss of
foot traffic, and some mainstays have switched focus, like a
Panda Express now operates largely standalone stores like of their
stores are stand alone as of UM. The aforementioned Cinnamon
and John B Juice and Dipping Dots. I believe are
(29:44):
opening kiosks in amusement parks and airports on college campuses,
stuff like that. Yes, there's a Panda Express in six
flags over Georgia. Oh, there you go. That's success. Have
I never heard it? But the concept was dead. It
matured into food halls involved shifted. Yes, these are I
(30:10):
guess fancier, more expensive and trinity for sure versions of
small food courts. They typically have a market aspect as
in each of the restaurants have to have a market
where you can buy things like spices or here it's
mostly like spices, or like dishware, olive oil. Yeah, things
(30:31):
like that. UM. Celebrity chefs might be involved and leading
the charge was Etaly, a food hall opened in old
Italian Vermouth factory in two thousand and seven and it
now has several locations. From food halls are expected to
triple from seen there was a seven increase in food
(30:51):
halls who UM. As of the third financial quarter of
there were ninety six major food hall projects in the
United States. With an additional thirty five slated to open
in the fourth quarter. Wow. Yeah. Interesting thing about these
um is a lot of them are revitalized abandoned malls,
especially Sears and Roebuck. It seems that's true for our
(31:13):
home food. Yeah we we are. We are in an
old Sears and Roebuck building. Yes we are, Yes we are.
And I've seen food halls described as millennial, post industrial urban,
and I would say it reflects a larger shift to
this food to table local is better idea. And I'm
not necessarily saying that it's what's happening. I think that's
just kind of the mindset. Yeah. And also foodism, the
(31:38):
food is often the draw as opposed to something to
fuel your need for shopping in your shopping spree. An
article from Box claims has to do with our desire
for quote authenticity. Yeah. A lot of the food concepts
at food halls are are independent ones, local local chefs,
local stuff. Yes, and for chefs from what I've read,
it does remove the startup cost um and usually ensures
(32:01):
a certain amount of foot traffic. And because of this,
they are frequently treated as incubators. Are like a way
to try a new new concept, new idea. Um, and
I have been. I think that maybe the last time
I went to New York. No, no, because we went recently.
But the time before that, I went to New York's
Chelsea Market, which is our home food hall is designed
(32:25):
based on that one, right, yeah, the same property owners
Jamestown also designed to Chelsea Market, and they also have
a newer one in New York called the Cab, I think,
and I went to that one and it was fact wow,
I waited in line a long time for some good
ice cream. M hm, yes, and I have my confession
(32:46):
is one of my favorite lame tourist things to do
when in New York City is to get a drink
in Grand Central Station and people watch, which has its
own like food court thing. Yeah, oh hey, that's people
watching is a wonderful spectator sport, it is. And malls
and food courts they are their high quality. Every time
(33:11):
I forget, because if we're like in an office, and
I always forget when I go downstairs randomly for something
that there is a mall below was and it's going
to be populated with people who are shopping there. Yeah yeah, yeah, um,
it's a it's it's it's a very it's very strange.
(33:31):
The whole uh post postmodern concept of live work play
of is very odd to me. Um. I my two
of my very dear friends once wrote the book and
lyrics for a Plane, which the main struggle was crampus
versus h shopping kind of um and one of one
(33:56):
of the lines in it that that stuck with me
was was this this very millennial character going, I always
wanted to live in a mall growing up, and now
I can. Yeah. Oh man, I feel like there's a
lot of stuff to unpack. Oh yeah, when it comes
to the mall. That's why there's so many horror things
(34:17):
based around it. Yeah, cramps one in the play. If
you're wondering, I figured, I figured. Um. But that about
brings us to the end of this episode. But we
do have a little bit more for you. But first
we have one more quick weak for a word from
our sponsor, and we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you,
(34:46):
and we're back with I didn't follow you on that one,
but I but I liked it. Yeah, it's hard to
do the stranger things. Oh words isn't fit. Yeah, but
I eighties sound in in general is hard. To accomplish
(35:07):
without since and I have not mastered that yet. Well,
another thing that I look forward to you working on
I'll put on my list. William shat your impression. That's
those are my goals. That's it, yep, Kate Rope, I
just finished listening to the Watermelon episode. In the middle
(35:27):
of it, I froze because you mentioned someone I know,
Slaughtermelon from Middle Georgia, Derby Demon Slaughter, who goes by
Lonnie when not on the track, is a longtime friend
and exactly as cool a person as you'd expect with
a name like that. But more to the point, I'm
running to answer Anne's hope she does, in fact or
one of those watermelon helmets. Yes, and she messages on
(35:47):
Facebook and she has like watermelon leggings to best Oh Van,
thank you Lonnie. Yeah, that's that's wonderful. That is so cool.
We were hoping somehow the word would get to you.
It's a small world, and that is delightful. Heck Sean wrote,
(36:08):
just finished the Chuck E Cheese episode and was a
little disappointed you didn't mention the Tim Wilson at Lanta
native now deceased song Chuck E Cheese Hell. Tim was
a Southern comedian who wrote many parody and original songs
to go along with his act. Many of them are
of actual events which may occur in the South, such
as the fistfight at a Southern Baptist church softball game. However,
(36:30):
Chuck E Cheese Hell is about everything y'all discussed in
the episode. I hope you will look it up on
YouTube and watch it if you haven't or weren't aware
of the song that sounds right up for Ali. Yeah,
Oh I haven't. I haven't opened it yet, but we will.
We will. Yeah, thank you. Yeah. No, anytime that there's
a parody song attached to something that we've covered, please
(36:53):
let us know. Yes, I on Sunday, I saw a
weird now in concert. Oh you did? It's great, Yeah,
and I had a very wonderful time. I'm a big
fan of parity songs. So yes, anytime, anytime. But in
the meantime, thanks to both of them for writing to us.
(37:14):
If you would like to write to us, you can.
Our email is Hello at saborpod dot com. We're also
on social media. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook,
and Twitter at savor pod. We do hope to hear
from you. Savor is a production of I heart Radio
and Stuff Media. For more podcasts from my heart Radio,
you can visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
(37:35):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thank you
as always to our superproducers Dylan Vagan and Andrew Howard.
Thanks to you for listening, and we hope that lots
more good things are coming your way.
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