Independence Center — Attraction in Independence

I have been going to Independence Center for at least 45 years. I have seen the mall change drastically in that time frame.

The mall business is literally dead from what it used to be. There are many stores that have closed or are closing in Independence Center.

The former Blue Ridge Mall a few miles down the road was really my place to go when I was a kid and it is gone! Walmart took over that location along with multiple other businesses which seem to be thriving. The mall could have had many of those businesses inside but they chose to keep rent ultra-high when there was no businesses in the mall to come to.

Independence Center is falling into the same footsteps as the Blue Ridge Mall.

With the huge decrease in Mall business because of all the online shopping and the mall pricing it's rent so high the tenants have no choice but to leave!

Some of the locations in the mall have been rented out multiple times in just a year or two. This definitely shows that it doesn't matter what the venue is selling there is just not enough customers to keep it going with the high rent.

If you've never been in business and rented a location in a mall or strip mall let me enlighten you on some of the expenses the tenant incurs during their stay.

First of all you have base rent which is usually several dollars per square foot of the location you're wanting. I have seen this price as high as $24 a square foot. If you've got a thousand square feet it's $24,000 but that is usually divided up by 12 months. It still adds up quickly.

Sometimes utilities can be included in your rent but not usually.

Then almost all malls have what's call triple-net. This is fees they charge you for maintaining the driveway, building and options like dusting the floors, picking up the trash or other things that you may or may not really use but you're charged for them. These can add up to being several hundred more dollars per month.

Then you still have to add on top of all these charges the tenant may have to pay their own lights, gas and water along with City, County licenses and insurance fees. This still does not include the payroll for employees and workman comp insurance. This expenses can easily add up to multiple thousands of dollars per month over the rent and triple-net charges.

Oh, I forgot to add on what the mall does to some businesses and ADD what they call a break point. Not only are you paying all the expenses mentioned above but they set a break point of what they think your business sales should be. If you pass the breakpoint then they want an extra percentage of your sales. As you can see the tenant is penalized because they actually made sales over the break point and the mall wants part of it.

This is kind of like having a job and your boss says you're going to get a raise of $1 an hour only to find out the raise put you in a different tax bracket and now it's costing you a $1.25 more in taxes.

Are you kind of getting an idea that malls are a lot like casinos. The mall has it in their favor of making money whether you do or not. It takes a lot of money and risk to have a business in a mall. Not saying you can't make money but it is getting more and more difficult.

I look for Independence Center to be closing up in the next few years as more customers buy online and sales slow leaving no choice but for more tenants to leave. As tenants leave the mall there is less places to buy from which usually means less business for the tenants that stayed and a lot of times the mall will try to raise rent to make up for the Lost Revenue of the tenants that are gone. This does nothing more than run off possible tenants because of the extremely high rent and cuts into the profit of the businesses that are still there which usually puts the final nail in their coffin!

Most tenants will stay until their contract is up and...

This is more of a rating for a specific "store" in the mall, not the mall itself. In the mall there is a new thing called safari riderz and the concept is great and overall a fun experience for all ages and I loved the one day that I worked there. Unfortunately due to a simple miscommunication I was instantly let go literally right after my employers were hyping me up telling me I was the perfect fit for the job. The issue that I'm having is I was told to come in for an interview which ended up with me getting trained for 2 hours before I left to avoid the coming winter storm that hit on the 4th of this month. I then came in Wednesday and worked my shift which I was paid for as well as my tips. But I was not paid for my time there on the 4th. Asking to be reimbursed a simple $20 for my time the owner got very bitter with me and told me no and threatened legal action if I continued to bother him, claiming nothing else is owed to me and that I was told I wouldn't be paid for training even though I have screenshots of my conversation with another employee in which it was never stated that I wouldn't get paid. It's also a bit weird to me that, when hired, they wanted me to use Snapchat for communication and it's clear why, so they can count on conversations getting deleted. If you see a post about the job just beware that they might take advantage of you as I feel they did me unfairly. For an owner to say great communication is important they really need to...

What can I say it's a good place to get some exercise me and my daughter went into Dillard's in the staff was actually really nice they welcome you in places expensive though but the staff was actually really friendly compared to when I was a young there's not much in the mall anymore what this is a nice place to just walk around and get some exercise hopefully they're working on getting more things in the mall hi Ashley forgot I like shopping in the mall walking around looking at prices and grabbing a few snacks and just sitting for a few minutes it wasn't bad sorry to see the mall so empty no Sears anymore no JCPenney's anymore wow we have to patronize our Malls we have to walk on the outside and just enjoy walking around the mall going inside and walking patronizing the few restaurants that are there also the restaurants, have to lower their price families won't come if the prices are outrageous I went to Anne's pretzel place and paid 17.00 for a cup of pretzels in a drink you better be paying the staff well like $15 an hour anyway we need to take back our malls and walk and just enjoy the environment walk outside around the mall inside the mall visit and...