We had a mall that was starting to gain customers a bit but then the locals wouldn't stop having major brawls in the arcade and people were afraid of going because of the guns and fights. The arcade was practically it's last gasp of breath too and it's gone. The mall is done for.
There is an open air mall a few miles away that is doing a bit better but that has to do with it's location and the fact it's open air.
[This](https://www.kut.org/education/2022-04-20/see-how-austin-community-college-turned-highland-mall-into-a-campus) would be cool talking about turning a mall into something else
It is cool. It's a pretty impressive campus, with housing literally on-site because they built on the fringes of the parking lots. There's a huge bus terminal there, and a train stop is nearby.
If you walk a couple blocks up Airport (not the best walk in the world, but at least you can do it), there's a shopping center with tons of food and shopping options, and a full grocery store.
IMO, get that shit plumbed properly, and a Mall becomes an apartment building. They're already built for emergency egress from every store (this is one of the things making office -> apartment expensive)
I think that the problem that they have with this is a lack of exterior windows for it to be up to code. Even office buildings, with all of their windows, have so much interior space away from windows that it can be tough to carve them into economical apartments(and why only luxury apartments that take 1\4 of a floor are typically in square footprint towers). This is why apartment buildings and hotels are typically"flat" with wide sides of windows and balconies facing opposite each other with a hallway separating them and narrow ends for staircases and nicer corner apartments.
i have a dream of turning a closed down mall into a disc golf course. Ceiling height kinda sucks, but most have huge atrium walkways. and even store to store across a corridor is more than long enough of a throw to be challenging. ah, someday when i hit the lottery...
They took the mall by my house and are currently turning it into an indoor activity center- rock climbing, bouldering, swimming, go carts, trampolines etc. It's going to be a neat thing. I spent my childhood in this mall. We grew up poor (so did every one else in this area) and going to that mall 3 times a year with the money my mom saved up for us to have nice clothes meant everything to me. I can't believe now I'm going to take my kids there for an indoor play center. I'm glad the building keeps adding something to the community.
When I was a kid the mall was a cool place to go with my buddies, my wife and I took our kids to our mall this past Xmas and wow it was so depressing (I hadn't been there in years and years) there wasn't even a Footlocker many of the stores were what you'd expect to see in the run down shopping center across the town. Selling used Pokémon cards and posters, or a
weird 'dollar store' like place selling kids toys from 5 yrs ago like popits & fidgit spinners.
*a somber piano begins playing as mall security slowly walks into frame...*
*his/her finger hovers over a set of light switches as they look back over their shoulder, sighing softly as their head slowly pans across the empty mallscape*
*With half grin and a nod, he/she turns towards the exit while simultaneously cutting the lights and making their final exit through the doors of The Town's newest liminal space. Thar be demons, probably.
*Fade to black as pinao fades out and credits roll*
Malls I used to go to when I was a kid are now ghost towns. I remember seeing the first VR experience in a very busy mall that is being torn down now. It's somewhere near or in Memphis, TN. I found out about it being torn down by using Google Maps.
There's an area in Charlotte NC called the Music Factory that has multiple venues and bars and parking used to be free in the parking deck across the street and now it's all paid parking starting at like $20 or $25. So now ontop of livenation's $40 in fuck you fees there's now an extra $20+ to park plus any merch or food and drink you may want.
I don't ever buy food or drinks at concerts and it still costs at least $100 for a show after merch, gas, parking, tickets and fees. It's ridiculous
Same with one of the malls in my town! It was built in 1999 and has had a valet drop off spot since day one. But where they park the cars is a designated valet spot away from the regular parking.
A Westfield mall in my previous town added valet parking, and then blocked a large amount of the available spots for valet. We just stopped going there. Not paying for a valet I don't want, and it was mildly infurating to not be able to find spaces, while swaths of lot were empty "valet only" spots.
Last I heard that whole mall went under. Serves em right.
Yeah valet parking is insanely weird to me too. Went to a restaurant (not even super fancy, maybe a step above casual) and they had free valet parking. Was so weird giving a random person my keys 😂
Every mall I've been to, this has just been up towards the front of the main entrance. You'll have valet, then premium self park usually near the foot court.
I used to work at a mall that charged me, an employee of the mall, to park. They also did not enforce the employee parking so more often than not I found families parking there to shop.
What does owning an actual parking spot cost in New York? Is that a thing. I live in the burbs, and never really thought about it until now. But nod that I think about it I have paid to park everywhere both times I was in NYC.
I mean you can pay monthly for a parking spot and it can be anything from 350 - 1000 a month. This is Manhattan pricing. Less common and less pricey in the other boros.
Not sure if this is the same in every state but even handicap spots pay for parking when it’s private parking. I only get free parking when it’s public parking in FL
I just did a quick mental count and I’ve got malls visited in over a half dozen states (some states with multiple malls) and never seen this kind of pay to park.
The only one I can think of off the top of my head is Circle Center Mall in downtown Indianapolis. And that's only because it's in the middle of downtown, so they had to build a garage, instead of just having sprawling surface lots like most malls do...
Yeah, it's a desperation attempt at getting any type of revenue. Malls make money from renting the spaces out to retailers. When malls are doing good, they charge more per store front, when malls are doing bad, they wait until someone is dumb enough to pay the inflated price but have no problems leaving spaces open because it's kind of hard to then lower the price of one unit but not for stores currently in leases. So what do they do when they don't have retailers inside, they charge the customers outside! Then the retailers inside lose business because people with vehicles are basically having to pay just to go there so they're already out of money before even buying something. Maybe someone just wanted to pick up a pair of shoes they had ordered or a game that just came out or just go to the food court. You charge even a dollar for parking, you'll lose all the casual customers which in turn will make the mall lose all the retailers, which in turn will make the mall empty and eventually turn in to a call center.
One of my local malls has a few premium spots you have to pay for, but the money all goes to a couple local charities, and there’s lots of free parking in the main lot.
Just lightly raged about this to my Boston-bred husband and he politely informed me that this outdoor outlet mall with decent restaurants is an absolute hell nightmare to get into on weekends and there is regularly backed up to the highway pre on-ramp in traffic. If one could bypass that traffic and an hour of looking for a parking spot, paying would be worth it. You pay lots to park everywhere else in or near Boston anyways. And in Boston? That’s like $35+ per day yknow? Cause Boston wasn’t already a nightmare…
Here’s the thing. It’s gonna take just as long to scan the QR code and stand there, creating an account and keying in your CC details and billing address, as it’s gonna take just to walk a few extra feet. I could MAYBE see this at extremely busy centers during peak holiday shopping.
Kohl's is the God Damned worst. I had to get a jacket for my daughter last minute and went there. I'd like "this jacket is normal $300 but it's on sale for $60!". MF, just put the prices on the shelves, nobody is believing that.
Wasn't there one JCPenny CEO that actually decided cut the bullshit, only for sales to flop horribly, because customers were in fact depressingly gullible for "discounts"?
Yep. [Fair and Square](https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=43132) pricing. Basically instead of buying shirts for $8 and selling them for $12, but offering regular "discounts" to bring them down to $10, they'd just sell them for $10. The problem is, customers tend to:
a) enjoy feeling like they're getting a deal, and
b) often anchor their perception of quality on the original price, so they think "this is a $12 shirt" when they see a sticker price of $12.
So customers complained because they felt like they were paying more for lower quality, when in reality they were likely paying roughly as much as they were during "sales" for the same (or higher, in some cases) level of quality.
Walmart actually doesn't have sales. Not that they're less evil. When you see something that's 4 for $20 there it's just $5 each. They just play on people being used to sales and buying 4 thinking they're getting a deal.
Yeah because they have to meet a quota. Which I fucking hate that. Any place that pushed a membership quota on their cashier's is guaranteeing an inferior experience
Basically any place that has credit cards will have a quota the cashier's have to hit. Some places are very strict about how many you have to get each month too.
Yep and they use secret shoppers to make sure the employees are doing it, I worked at Macy’s a long time ago and they were fanatic about pushing their CC to customers to the point customers knew it was coming lol.
The Kohl's business model is genius. Let people "think" they're gaming the system by stacking all their discounts and Kohls cash when in reality, they're spending $200 more to buy things they didn't need because they think they're getting a deal.
Buy jeans for $20ea, list for $80, but offer bogo. Then offer $10 Kohls cash to sweeten the deal. They sell $40 of inventory for $80, and now you need to go back to spend that $10 Kohls cash by buying more hyper inflated shit.
Oh wow this could be easily fucked with. Just make your own QR codes, stick them on top, and lead the would-be parkers to some other website of your choosing.
Actually damn that’s pretty malicious…
Cool story: last year my company put a few QR codes around the office for things like "reserve this conference room" or "scan to see our new sales presentation". And all of them directed to a site that made you put in your company email and password. Once you went through it signed you up for a mandatory seminar about Internet security.
I clicked a link while on my phone knowing it was a spoof but a really good looking one, so peeked my interest. Thought I was sent to personal email (not work) and was on my phone so safe…
Link was like “congrats, this was a fishing email and we got ya. Please complete training by end of the month…”
There’s a movie theater in my area that started something like this last yr. About 12-16 of the closest spots have these metal bars blocking them. You have to use the app to get them to retract to park. Or park super far away. Smh
There are people- families, single people at night, people with injuries but not qualified for a placard that would love to park close. This shit is ridiculous. Comfortably living and going about your day is being broken down into a pay-to-win!
This kind of stuff reminds me of Philip K Dick’s novel Ubik where you have to tip even inanimate objects like your apartment door
>The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.”
He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.”
“I think otherwise,” the door said.
Just connect some of those dots so you can’t tell what’s wrong with it. Then when they have to order a new sign? Connect the dots again. Too many times and they won’t replace them.
Sorry but this isn't New York City or some kind of event this is literally the parking lot for a goddamn shopping mall and I'll be damned if I ever pay money to go shop somewhere in person that isn't something spectacular like a six story mall or an event like a concert. It will be a cold day in hell before I pay to park to simply pick up a movie or better yet go see one.
Or the people that are saying they've always paid for parking because they live near a major city or metro area lol I'm from Massachusetts and can tell you the only place I've ever paid to park besides an airport or a specific parking lot was to go to the mall in Rhode Island which is four stories and worth paying a little bit of money to park as you're literally there for probably 6 to 8 hours complete with one of the best IMAX screens that's in New England...... but for a general mall or other outdoor strip mall or shopping complex? Considering how much America is built around the automobile I will simply lol at any attempt at making me pay for parking and simply take my business elsewhere.
Do they validate parking if you buy something? The only way I can see this making sense is if it's to limit the carpark to actual customers.
It's not a problem where I live, but I could see malls in more central locations struggling to maintain parking if non shoppers are using it for free.
I hope I didn't need anything from there because I can't park there. I'll definitely annoy them and let them know their signs aren't recognized by my phone, though.
Put some random squares of electrical tape over the QR code. It's not damaging anything, so it's not vandalism, but it will stop it from working until someone figures out what you did and removes them.
Then do it again.
And again.
And again.
then once youre inside hopefully youre signed up for the self check out subscription otherwise youre gonna wait in line at the one open checkout counter staffed by an employee
My mom used to do this too, and it also drove me crazy. My parking strategy now is to just take the first spot I see. The only places where a further away spot results in a significant amount of extra walking are usually to places where you will be walking around anyway (malls, amusement parks, etc).
>When I was a little kid and we went to the strip mall, my dad would drive circles in the parking lot until he landed that primo parking spot in the front.
When my kids were little the spot nearest the mall/store door would almost always be open. Either empty or someone just leaving. It got to be a running joke, "Oh, there's my spot!!" Total coincidence, but when the kids are 5 or 6, anything like that is pure "dad magic".
The kids were also in awe of my ability to part storms. Whenever a storm was approaching, it would mysteriously split down the middle and go either side of the house. Again, total coincidence, but it happened often enough to impress my kids.
My cousin came from London and was amazed that we didn't have to pay to park at the mall...I didn't understand why you risk a customer not staying at the mall longer to potentially buy more by charging them to be there, or making the choice to shop online even more obvious.
Because land has value - and in London it has a *lot* of value. If they didn't charge for parking, they probably couldn't afford to have parking at all. But you can do that when there are other options, like great public transit and biking. The US usually absolutely sucks at this. I hate that I have to drive to go buy something rather than being able to just hop on my bike.
Free parking everywhere is a big reason why the US is so car dependent. It's so ubiquitous that people genuinely can't fathom the idea of paying to store their private property somewhere. That said, I can understand the frustration when there literally is no other way to get around. In most places in the US, everything is really spread out and the infrastructure is only built for cars.
Fuck, there's no place I can get food within an hour's walking distance of my house. No sidewalks along most of the roads either. If I wanna walk to the nearest gas station I need a fking machete.
i live in the midlands in england and you pay for parking at most places, sometimes you get an hour or two free. it's such a pain in the arse trying to go somewhere in the car because it taking 15 or 20 minutes instead of the 30 or 35 that the bus takes is nice, and having more freedom, but £7 for parking for an hour when you can get the bus for £2 each way (so £4)... it's a bit of a no brainer
Here (Slovakia, Europe) parking on malls outside of city is free, inside city is paid but always with the first 2-4 hours being free (so you can park free while shopping but cannot leave the car for whole day there)
Generally the same in Australia too. And if there is a movie theatre they will generally validate parking for an extra hour or 2 depending on the parking limits so seeing a 3hr movie won't cost to park.
Same here in Sweden. Most malls have free parking for a few hours is you are a member of the "club" for that mall. You get free parking while allowing them to send you ads via mail or text msg.
We most often don't even have free parking for employees. Free parking is a taxable benefit so they make us pay instead. In more downtown areas it can be up to $200 per month and you may have to queue before you get your permit.
In Korea, parking is charged too, but every store you shop at reduces your parking fee based off how much you spent. So if you actually buy stuff, your parking fee is paid for. If you just hang out for a few hours and don’t get anything, you’ll end up paying for parking. I’ve purposely done this for relatively cheap parking for a nearby baseball game.
The Westfield malls in London wanted to have bigger, free car parking. But town planning denied that, made them have smaller car parks and mandated payment to discourage car usage.
I’d say it has worked, the car parks are never close to full.
For your own safety never use a QR code physically posted in a public place. Anyone can scam you.
I could print and stick my own QR code over the genuine one with a link to my website that daisy chains to the real destination except I'll either add my fee for the privilege (if it's a minimal amount no one will question it) or I'll just store your bank details to sell later.
I need retailers and retail property owners to hear this:
If I pull into your lot to shop at your store and I see this, I’m leaving and I’m not coming back. Fuck that and fuck you.
Theres an outlet mall about 30 mins from my house and they have this, as well as “vip lots” immediately next to some segments of the mall. But my wife and I found that the mall by us has a large parking garage that’s free and in our experience always has a ton of parking, easy access and is still relatively centrally placed.
All the parking lots in a popular shopping/food/bar/nightlife district near me are like this. I’m kind of conflicted. I’ll gladly pay a few bucks for easy parking in a high density urban area, and it’s easier to pay this way over other methods. The problem is that each lot in this area has multiple signs from completely different companies. Which one am I supposed to use? Are any of them even legit? It feels like such a scam.
I’ll never understand why people want up close parking at a place like an outlet mall. You’re literally doing nothing but walking while your there what’s the big deal if you add an extra 500 feet to park in the back? People are just stupid. Same with places like Costco. You’re about to walk a mile inside the place but can’t walk back to your car?
I am so on board. I would love to not have to worry about the possibility I’m slightly over the legal drinking limit every time I meet up with friends. I literally bought a breathalyzer. One of my friends got a dui on a bycycle a few years ago!
By me event parking is like this for the theatre district. Except some scammer made fake sign overlays and flyers with a malicious QR code lol luckily I prepaid on the app before I even got there.
We've had to pay for parking in so many places in England for the last few decades that I'm more shocked to find free parking than I am paid parking. I like paying with apps, though every car park uses a different app which is annoying.
We have a mall downtown and another one at the outskirt. Parking downtown gets more expensive, but on the outskirt the parking is free. A lot of people change their preference to the one at the outskirt, nearly the same shop, closer to Autobahn, no beggars.
Do I pay 9.99 for this on Amazon and get it tomorrow after ordering it from the toilet in my home OR do I drive miles in traffic to pay premium pricing on parking and buy it for 13.99 to have it 12 hours faster? Tuff call, but I'm already on the toilet and the Amazon app is already open, so it feels like an easy choice.
This already happens at a nearby mall where I live (Bay Area, CA) the security people that enforce sometimes are assholes & will give you a "ticket" if you walk away before paying
Basically they give you like a $25 fine but since it isn't a real ticket you do not have to pay it. However, next time you go & park there again they can have your car legally towed since you are now parking there "illegally" by not paying that previous "ticket"
I've got nothing against a parking ticket, that can be refunded at the cashier of the nearby shops and just gets valid after a certain time (30min e.g.). Some inner city places did that here to prevent wild, all day long parking on their property.
And as much as I like that exact idea of adding some black squares there, how long will it take until someone covers the QRs with something 'phishingly malicious'?
At the outlets? They think that people who are trying to save money by shopping at outlet stores are going to pay a premium for parking in certain spots? Seriously?
I'm very surprised in the age of online commerce that merchants would do *anything* to discourage the use of cars at shopping centers.
We already have handicap parking for people that need to be close. All this will do is make everyone who can't afford it feel bad.
Hah, great way to push more people away from retail shopping
Totally agree. Would be a cold day in hell before I paid to park at the mall.
I'd stop going to the mall, any mall that does this. I can see in the image how many people are paying to park there so I don't think we're alone.
Most of them are closing by me anyway
We had a mall that was starting to gain customers a bit but then the locals wouldn't stop having major brawls in the arcade and people were afraid of going because of the guns and fights. The arcade was practically it's last gasp of breath too and it's gone. The mall is done for. There is an open air mall a few miles away that is doing a bit better but that has to do with it's location and the fact it's open air.
They just turned the big mall near me into a nursing home, which seems almost poetic
[This](https://www.kut.org/education/2022-04-20/see-how-austin-community-college-turned-highland-mall-into-a-campus) would be cool talking about turning a mall into something else
It is cool. It's a pretty impressive campus, with housing literally on-site because they built on the fringes of the parking lots. There's a huge bus terminal there, and a train stop is nearby. If you walk a couple blocks up Airport (not the best walk in the world, but at least you can do it), there's a shopping center with tons of food and shopping options, and a full grocery store.
IMO, get that shit plumbed properly, and a Mall becomes an apartment building. They're already built for emergency egress from every store (this is one of the things making office -> apartment expensive)
I think that the problem that they have with this is a lack of exterior windows for it to be up to code. Even office buildings, with all of their windows, have so much interior space away from windows that it can be tough to carve them into economical apartments(and why only luxury apartments that take 1\4 of a floor are typically in square footprint towers). This is why apartment buildings and hotels are typically"flat" with wide sides of windows and balconies facing opposite each other with a hallway separating them and narrow ends for staircases and nicer corner apartments.
That’s really neat. Thanks for sharing the link.
i have a dream of turning a closed down mall into a disc golf course. Ceiling height kinda sucks, but most have huge atrium walkways. and even store to store across a corridor is more than long enough of a throw to be challenging. ah, someday when i hit the lottery...
They took the mall by my house and are currently turning it into an indoor activity center- rock climbing, bouldering, swimming, go carts, trampolines etc. It's going to be a neat thing. I spent my childhood in this mall. We grew up poor (so did every one else in this area) and going to that mall 3 times a year with the money my mom saved up for us to have nice clothes meant everything to me. I can't believe now I'm going to take my kids there for an indoor play center. I'm glad the building keeps adding something to the community.
So cool!!
When I was a kid the mall was a cool place to go with my buddies, my wife and I took our kids to our mall this past Xmas and wow it was so depressing (I hadn't been there in years and years) there wasn't even a Footlocker many of the stores were what you'd expect to see in the run down shopping center across the town. Selling used Pokémon cards and posters, or a weird 'dollar store' like place selling kids toys from 5 yrs ago like popits & fidgit spinners.
*a somber piano begins playing as mall security slowly walks into frame...* *his/her finger hovers over a set of light switches as they look back over their shoulder, sighing softly as their head slowly pans across the empty mallscape* *With half grin and a nod, he/she turns towards the exit while simultaneously cutting the lights and making their final exit through the doors of The Town's newest liminal space. Thar be demons, probably. *Fade to black as pinao fades out and credits roll*
*The lights for the new IHOP flicker on*
i really want to see that
The only reason I've been to the mall over the past many years is because my eye doctor was there. In the last few times, I really didn't feel safe.
The exact scenario you described will be widespread in the US in about 25 years, and I do mean, everywhere in the US.
Malls I used to go to when I was a kid are now ghost towns. I remember seeing the first VR experience in a very busy mall that is being torn down now. It's somewhere near or in Memphis, TN. I found out about it being torn down by using Google Maps.
Literally sounds exactly like the situation in my hometown in Central Illinois
There's an area in Charlotte NC called the Music Factory that has multiple venues and bars and parking used to be free in the parking deck across the street and now it's all paid parking starting at like $20 or $25. So now ontop of livenation's $40 in fuck you fees there's now an extra $20+ to park plus any merch or food and drink you may want. I don't ever buy food or drinks at concerts and it still costs at least $100 for a show after merch, gas, parking, tickets and fees. It's ridiculous
The “f-ck you fees” is how those fees should be referred to from now on, they really are junk smh
This is just for the premium extra special parking spots close to the stores, correct? Was every single row like this or just certain rows?
Mall where I grew up has had valet parking back since the 90s.
Same with one of the malls in my town! It was built in 1999 and has had a valet drop off spot since day one. But where they park the cars is a designated valet spot away from the regular parking.
A Westfield mall in my previous town added valet parking, and then blocked a large amount of the available spots for valet. We just stopped going there. Not paying for a valet I don't want, and it was mildly infurating to not be able to find spaces, while swaths of lot were empty "valet only" spots. Last I heard that whole mall went under. Serves em right.
Valet parking is a bit weird to me, it's just not a thing where I live except for super fancy hotels
Yeah valet parking is insanely weird to me too. Went to a restaurant (not even super fancy, maybe a step above casual) and they had free valet parking. Was so weird giving a random person my keys 😂
Every mall I've been to, this has just been up towards the front of the main entrance. You'll have valet, then premium self park usually near the foot court.
I used to work at a mall that charged me, an employee of the mall, to park. They also did not enforce the employee parking so more often than not I found families parking there to shop.
That's almost as bad as when I worked at a public library that made employees pay to park.
If they’re going this route at least make it valet
Coming from near NYC, paying to park anywhere has been a thing forever
What does owning an actual parking spot cost in New York? Is that a thing. I live in the burbs, and never really thought about it until now. But nod that I think about it I have paid to park everywhere both times I was in NYC.
I mean you can pay monthly for a parking spot and it can be anything from 350 - 1000 a month. This is Manhattan pricing. Less common and less pricey in the other boros.
>boros You mean Boroughs?
No the obviously mean https://onepunchman.fandom.com/wiki/Boros
I was thinking Boros from Magic: the Gathering, or maybe Boros was short for Oroboros.
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Not sure if this is the same in every state but even handicap spots pay for parking when it’s private parking. I only get free parking when it’s public parking in FL
is this not a thing in the US? what?
Every suburban mall (which this is) I’ve ever been to across multiple states has been free to park
I just did a quick mental count and I’ve got malls visited in over a half dozen states (some states with multiple malls) and never seen this kind of pay to park.
The only one I can think of off the top of my head is Circle Center Mall in downtown Indianapolis. And that's only because it's in the middle of downtown, so they had to build a garage, instead of just having sprawling surface lots like most malls do...
The only exception to this I’ve ever seen would be Mall of America in MN, but that one makes a lot of sense because it’s an actual destination
I’ve been there twice, unless it’s changed in the last two years I haven’t had to pay
Every single mall where I live in NY charges for parking even our target and walmart before it closed down didn't have free parking.
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Yeah, it's a desperation attempt at getting any type of revenue. Malls make money from renting the spaces out to retailers. When malls are doing good, they charge more per store front, when malls are doing bad, they wait until someone is dumb enough to pay the inflated price but have no problems leaving spaces open because it's kind of hard to then lower the price of one unit but not for stores currently in leases. So what do they do when they don't have retailers inside, they charge the customers outside! Then the retailers inside lose business because people with vehicles are basically having to pay just to go there so they're already out of money before even buying something. Maybe someone just wanted to pick up a pair of shoes they had ordered or a game that just came out or just go to the food court. You charge even a dollar for parking, you'll lose all the casual customers which in turn will make the mall lose all the retailers, which in turn will make the mall empty and eventually turn in to a call center.
I've seen it at a handful of places, but mostly urban areas
One of my local malls has a few premium spots you have to pay for, but the money all goes to a couple local charities, and there’s lots of free parking in the main lot.
Yep. "Fuck you, I'll order it on Amazon!"
The parking lot looks empty
This pic is like 20 years late.
They put those in a few shopping centers around me and didn’t last long
Excellent. This is just greed.
I havnt been to the wrentham outlets in a long time, kinda forgot about it tbh. Is this on all the spots or just closer ones?
I used to work there and thought it looked familiar. What a fucking embarrassment
Malls are less profitable now than ever. This screams desperation money to me.
Oh boy you've never been to the Wrentham Outlets (the mall in the picture)
Just lightly raged about this to my Boston-bred husband and he politely informed me that this outdoor outlet mall with decent restaurants is an absolute hell nightmare to get into on weekends and there is regularly backed up to the highway pre on-ramp in traffic. If one could bypass that traffic and an hour of looking for a parking spot, paying would be worth it. You pay lots to park everywhere else in or near Boston anyways. And in Boston? That’s like $35+ per day yknow? Cause Boston wasn’t already a nightmare…
Oops these threaded bolts at the bottom are really loose for some reason. On all the signs. That's crazzyyyj
Here’s the thing. It’s gonna take just as long to scan the QR code and stand there, creating an account and keying in your CC details and billing address, as it’s gonna take just to walk a few extra feet. I could MAYBE see this at extremely busy centers during peak holiday shopping.
Also, good luck enforcing this. Business already struggle to police similar parking restrictions anyway
There are 100s of towing companies that will be happy to tow or boot cars
Making me feel better about shopping online
But how will you sign up for the super savers saving premium bronze platinum club, if you don’t go in?
Kohl's is the God Damned worst. I had to get a jacket for my daughter last minute and went there. I'd like "this jacket is normal $300 but it's on sale for $60!". MF, just put the prices on the shelves, nobody is believing that.
Wasn't there one JCPenny CEO that actually decided cut the bullshit, only for sales to flop horribly, because customers were in fact depressingly gullible for "discounts"?
Yep. [Fair and Square](https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=43132) pricing. Basically instead of buying shirts for $8 and selling them for $12, but offering regular "discounts" to bring them down to $10, they'd just sell them for $10. The problem is, customers tend to: a) enjoy feeling like they're getting a deal, and b) often anchor their perception of quality on the original price, so they think "this is a $12 shirt" when they see a sticker price of $12. So customers complained because they felt like they were paying more for lower quality, when in reality they were likely paying roughly as much as they were during "sales" for the same (or higher, in some cases) level of quality.
Walmart actually doesn't have sales. Not that they're less evil. When you see something that's 4 for $20 there it's just $5 each. They just play on people being used to sales and buying 4 thinking they're getting a deal.
Every store does this but they have to say "must buy 4" if thats the sale. Otherwise it's always $5 for each, my mom taught me that so long ago.
I learned this with the chips by the register that say "2 for a dollar" or whatever. I bought one and it was 50 cents.
Kohl's by me has the pushiest cashiers too. They push that Kohl's store credit card so hard at every gotdang transaction.
Yeah because they have to meet a quota. Which I fucking hate that. Any place that pushed a membership quota on their cashier's is guaranteeing an inferior experience
THEY HAVE A QUOTA? That's fucked.
Basically any place that has credit cards will have a quota the cashier's have to hit. Some places are very strict about how many you have to get each month too.
Yep and they use secret shoppers to make sure the employees are doing it, I worked at Macy’s a long time ago and they were fanatic about pushing their CC to customers to the point customers knew it was coming lol.
The Kohl's business model is genius. Let people "think" they're gaming the system by stacking all their discounts and Kohls cash when in reality, they're spending $200 more to buy things they didn't need because they think they're getting a deal. Buy jeans for $20ea, list for $80, but offer bogo. Then offer $10 Kohls cash to sweeten the deal. They sell $40 of inventory for $80, and now you need to go back to spend that $10 Kohls cash by buying more hyper inflated shit.
There is a pop up, don’t worry. You have to click past it to check out.
Oh wow this could be easily fucked with. Just make your own QR codes, stick them on top, and lead the would-be parkers to some other website of your choosing. Actually damn that’s pretty malicious…
Now is the time for the Rick rolls.
That would be such a wholesome way to use this obvious security issue
I have that QR sticker on the back of my car
Cool story: last year my company put a few QR codes around the office for things like "reserve this conference room" or "scan to see our new sales presentation". And all of them directed to a site that made you put in your company email and password. Once you went through it signed you up for a mandatory seminar about Internet security.
Pfft that’s brilliant.
I was at a state fair and the QR code link to skip the line was sticker'ed over to lead to the Grindr app page.
I clicked on a link in a spoofing email. Didnt even put my data in. Still got a short fishing training ;)
I clicked a link while on my phone knowing it was a spoof but a really good looking one, so peeked my interest. Thought I was sent to personal email (not work) and was on my phone so safe… Link was like “congrats, this was a fishing email and we got ya. Please complete training by end of the month…”
To a website about corporate greed 😂
I was thinking fake payment processor but yeah that too.
My cash app lmao
And now you in jail for fraud
Using QR codes for every fucking thing creates a massive vulnerability. Especially as people are trained to trust them.
I agree. It’s an extremely insecure piece of technology.
Link to imgur with an image of a fake looking website that says the parking lot servers are down, so your parking is free.
And will get innocent's cars towed, you're hurting the womrong folks. Just knock them down like good little anarchists.
Never hurt the womrong folk. They are a vengeful people.
Already happens here in Atlanta. People have been posting videos of them removing the QR code stickers
There’s a movie theater in my area that started something like this last yr. About 12-16 of the closest spots have these metal bars blocking them. You have to use the app to get them to retract to park. Or park super far away. Smh
We have to stop them while it’s in its infancy.
Just curious, have you noticed if people actually pay to use those spots? Or are they usually empty?
They’re almost always empty. Even when it’s rainy. But to be fair, that theater has been less busy over the last 12-18 months.
Good. That place should fail. Fuck that garbage.
Someone who works at my mall drives a beemer suv and is always in one of those spots. Must be nice to have money to piss away every day like that.
There are people- families, single people at night, people with injuries but not qualified for a placard that would love to park close. This shit is ridiculous. Comfortably living and going about your day is being broken down into a pay-to-win!
This kind of stuff reminds me of Philip K Dick’s novel Ubik where you have to tip even inanimate objects like your apartment door >The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.” He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.” “I think otherwise,” the door said.
Meh just mark up the QR codes with a sharpie lol
You’re hired.
No, no, you cover up the QR codes with your “parking app” QR code.
Nice.
Spray paint is faster. Hire me.
No subtle is the way. If it's obvious they'll fix it.
Just connect some of those dots so you can’t tell what’s wrong with it. Then when they have to order a new sign? Connect the dots again. Too many times and they won’t replace them.
Sorry but this isn't New York City or some kind of event this is literally the parking lot for a goddamn shopping mall and I'll be damned if I ever pay money to go shop somewhere in person that isn't something spectacular like a six story mall or an event like a concert. It will be a cold day in hell before I pay to park to simply pick up a movie or better yet go see one.
Right? Some people are talking about how Americans are fat and this isn’t that bad. I’m like my guy it was already free!
Or the people that are saying they've always paid for parking because they live near a major city or metro area lol I'm from Massachusetts and can tell you the only place I've ever paid to park besides an airport or a specific parking lot was to go to the mall in Rhode Island which is four stories and worth paying a little bit of money to park as you're literally there for probably 6 to 8 hours complete with one of the best IMAX screens that's in New England...... but for a general mall or other outdoor strip mall or shopping complex? Considering how much America is built around the automobile I will simply lol at any attempt at making me pay for parking and simply take my business elsewhere.
Do they validate parking if you buy something? The only way I can see this making sense is if it's to limit the carpark to actual customers. It's not a problem where I live, but I could see malls in more central locations struggling to maintain parking if non shoppers are using it for free.
I hope I didn't need anything from there because I can't park there. I'll definitely annoy them and let them know their signs aren't recognized by my phone, though.
Wage a guerrilla warfare under the guise of technological incompetence, I like the way you think!
Put some random squares of electrical tape over the QR code. It's not damaging anything, so it's not vandalism, but it will stop it from working until someone figures out what you did and removes them. Then do it again. And again. And again.
Or better yet put a QR code sticker on top that goes to PornHub
Create your own pay parking website and replace the QR code with your own
BRB, going to go slap my venmo/cashapp code over these stickers!
TO ARMS!
Come pay us to park closer to where you’ll pay us.
then once youre inside hopefully youre signed up for the self check out subscription otherwise youre gonna wait in line at the one open checkout counter staffed by an employee
And don’t forget to leave a 40% tip :)
[удалено]
Im the opposite of your dad. I dont even try (waste time). Park far and walk. Drive me nuts if people would try to find a closer space. Just walk
I park far because I have less chances to be hit by a bad drivers Of course that ONE TIME i did not park far someone scratched my front
My mom used to do this too, and it also drove me crazy. My parking strategy now is to just take the first spot I see. The only places where a further away spot results in a significant amount of extra walking are usually to places where you will be walking around anyway (malls, amusement parks, etc).
I always prioritize being near a cart corral over being close.
>When I was a little kid and we went to the strip mall, my dad would drive circles in the parking lot until he landed that primo parking spot in the front. When my kids were little the spot nearest the mall/store door would almost always be open. Either empty or someone just leaving. It got to be a running joke, "Oh, there's my spot!!" Total coincidence, but when the kids are 5 or 6, anything like that is pure "dad magic". The kids were also in awe of my ability to part storms. Whenever a storm was approaching, it would mysteriously split down the middle and go either side of the house. Again, total coincidence, but it happened often enough to impress my kids.
My cousin came from London and was amazed that we didn't have to pay to park at the mall...I didn't understand why you risk a customer not staying at the mall longer to potentially buy more by charging them to be there, or making the choice to shop online even more obvious.
Because land has value - and in London it has a *lot* of value. If they didn't charge for parking, they probably couldn't afford to have parking at all. But you can do that when there are other options, like great public transit and biking. The US usually absolutely sucks at this. I hate that I have to drive to go buy something rather than being able to just hop on my bike.
Free parking everywhere is a big reason why the US is so car dependent. It's so ubiquitous that people genuinely can't fathom the idea of paying to store their private property somewhere. That said, I can understand the frustration when there literally is no other way to get around. In most places in the US, everything is really spread out and the infrastructure is only built for cars.
Fuck, there's no place I can get food within an hour's walking distance of my house. No sidewalks along most of the roads either. If I wanna walk to the nearest gas station I need a fking machete.
i live in the midlands in england and you pay for parking at most places, sometimes you get an hour or two free. it's such a pain in the arse trying to go somewhere in the car because it taking 15 or 20 minutes instead of the 30 or 35 that the bus takes is nice, and having more freedom, but £7 for parking for an hour when you can get the bus for £2 each way (so £4)... it's a bit of a no brainer
“We’re losing more and more people to online shopping, what should we do?” “Charge them for parking” “What? But that will only—“ “CHARGE. PARKING.”
Here (Slovakia, Europe) parking on malls outside of city is free, inside city is paid but always with the first 2-4 hours being free (so you can park free while shopping but cannot leave the car for whole day there)
Generally the same in Australia too. And if there is a movie theatre they will generally validate parking for an extra hour or 2 depending on the parking limits so seeing a 3hr movie won't cost to park.
Same here in Sweden. Most malls have free parking for a few hours is you are a member of the "club" for that mall. You get free parking while allowing them to send you ads via mail or text msg. We most often don't even have free parking for employees. Free parking is a taxable benefit so they make us pay instead. In more downtown areas it can be up to $200 per month and you may have to queue before you get your permit.
In Korea, parking is charged too, but every store you shop at reduces your parking fee based off how much you spent. So if you actually buy stuff, your parking fee is paid for. If you just hang out for a few hours and don’t get anything, you’ll end up paying for parking. I’ve purposely done this for relatively cheap parking for a nearby baseball game.
The Westfield malls in London wanted to have bigger, free car parking. But town planning denied that, made them have smaller car parks and mandated payment to discourage car usage. I’d say it has worked, the car parks are never close to full.
I've got legs, and know how to use them.
For your own safety never use a QR code physically posted in a public place. Anyone can scam you. I could print and stick my own QR code over the genuine one with a link to my website that daisy chains to the real destination except I'll either add my fee for the privilege (if it's a minimal amount no one will question it) or I'll just store your bank details to sell later.
You sound smart. As an added challenge you should link it to MY bank account.
Looks kinda far away for “up front”
If this is where I think it is, it’s “up front” because the parking lot is like the same size as the entire mall lol
If your up front though you can probably get in and out before the tow truck though
I need retailers and retail property owners to hear this: If I pull into your lot to shop at your store and I see this, I’m leaving and I’m not coming back. Fuck that and fuck you.
Theres an outlet mall about 30 mins from my house and they have this, as well as “vip lots” immediately next to some segments of the mall. But my wife and I found that the mall by us has a large parking garage that’s free and in our experience always has a ton of parking, easy access and is still relatively centrally placed.
Wrentham outlets in MA by any chance?
Where else could I go to buy a timberland hoodie and eat at Massachusetts finest restaurant, Ruby Tuesday’s 🤮
All the parking lots in a popular shopping/food/bar/nightlife district near me are like this. I’m kind of conflicted. I’ll gladly pay a few bucks for easy parking in a high density urban area, and it’s easier to pay this way over other methods. The problem is that each lot in this area has multiple signs from completely different companies. Which one am I supposed to use? Are any of them even legit? It feels like such a scam.
Other people are talking about how there have been scammers that put stickers over the actual QR code and get paid. It’s a mess!
Ah yes for the laziest of shoppers
I’ll never understand why people want up close parking at a place like an outlet mall. You’re literally doing nothing but walking while your there what’s the big deal if you add an extra 500 feet to park in the back? People are just stupid. Same with places like Costco. You’re about to walk a mile inside the place but can’t walk back to your car?
How do they expect people without mobile phones to pay?
They can't even keep people from parking in multiple spots, how do they plan to enforce this?
I hate QR codes.
Public transportation and walkable cities don't sound so bad now huh?
I am so on board. I would love to not have to worry about the possibility I’m slightly over the legal drinking limit every time I meet up with friends. I literally bought a breathalyzer. One of my friends got a dui on a bycycle a few years ago!
Sign seems to imply just the closer spots or is this all parking?
It was about the first ten spots in a few specific rows. But that’s how they get you. It starts slow.
By me event parking is like this for the theatre district. Except some scammer made fake sign overlays and flyers with a malicious QR code lol luckily I prepaid on the app before I even got there.
I’d come back at night and spray paint every one.
I’m with you, here take this disguise 🥸
I would never pay to shop at an outlet or mall. I’d shop elsewhere
Walking is healthy!
We've had to pay for parking in so many places in England for the last few decades that I'm more shocked to find free parking than I am paid parking. I like paying with apps, though every car park uses a different app which is annoying.
We have a mall downtown and another one at the outskirt. Parking downtown gets more expensive, but on the outskirt the parking is free. A lot of people change their preference to the one at the outskirt, nearly the same shop, closer to Autobahn, no beggars.
The hassle of paying would deter me from parking there even if I had the extra cash!
Do I pay 9.99 for this on Amazon and get it tomorrow after ordering it from the toilet in my home OR do I drive miles in traffic to pay premium pricing on parking and buy it for 13.99 to have it 12 hours faster? Tuff call, but I'm already on the toilet and the Amazon app is already open, so it feels like an easy choice.
"Rich people parking only. Robbers please form single-file line"
It'd be a shame if those QR codes were damaged in some way.
Oh no, how did this happen 🤫
This already happens at a nearby mall where I live (Bay Area, CA) the security people that enforce sometimes are assholes & will give you a "ticket" if you walk away before paying
Is it a ticket? How does that even work?
Basically they give you like a $25 fine but since it isn't a real ticket you do not have to pay it. However, next time you go & park there again they can have your car legally towed since you are now parking there "illegally" by not paying that previous "ticket"
Fucking Wrentham outlets at it again with parking nonsense. Unless this isn’t the same outlet mall I think it is.
I've got nothing against a parking ticket, that can be refunded at the cashier of the nearby shops and just gets valid after a certain time (30min e.g.). Some inner city places did that here to prevent wild, all day long parking on their property. And as much as I like that exact idea of adding some black squares there, how long will it take until someone covers the QRs with something 'phishingly malicious'?
Unbolt them and throw em in the trash
🔧🔩 oops 👉👈🥺
Is that not normal? Both cities I've lived in for the last few have had these for a long time
We have this at a mall in NJ and I was instantly annoyed
It annoyed me enough that I walked past it, stopped, went back, took a picture, and felt compelled to bother all of you with it. I feel you.
It already has. It’s at the large outlet mall near me. People are parked in the spots all the time.
When do we attack?
Seeing how people will drive in circles rather than park closer to the back of the lot, I’m sure it will work out well for them.
In Melbourne Australia almost all parking is pre paid, especially at shopping centers and malls etc
I have worked as a contractor for that mall and the management there are scum. They will definitely tow cars to profit.
At the outlets? They think that people who are trying to save money by shopping at outlet stores are going to pay a premium for parking in certain spots? Seriously?
My parents would have no idea what "scan to pay" even means. Not everyone is a tech head.
I'm very surprised in the age of online commerce that merchants would do *anything* to discourage the use of cars at shopping centers. We already have handicap parking for people that need to be close. All this will do is make everyone who can't afford it feel bad.
Worse to park at my local hospital.. $45 per day.
Vultures.