A strip mall is an open-area shopping center where the stores are arranged in a row, with a sidewalk

Sidewalk

A sidewalk, or pavement, footpath, footway, and sometimes platform, is a path along the side of a road. A sidewalk may accommodate moderate changes in grade and is normally separated from the vehicular section by a curb...

 in front. Strip malls are typically developed as a unit and have large parking lot

Parking lot

A parking lot , also known as car lot, is a cleared area that is intended for parking vehicles. Usually, the term refers to a dedicated area that has been provided with a durable or semi-durable surface....

s in front. They face major traffic arterials

Arterial road

An arterial road, or arterial thoroughfare, is a high-capacity urban road. The primary function of an arterial road is to deliver traffic from collector roads to freeways, and between urban centres at the highest level of service possible. As such, many arteries are limited-access roads, or feature...

 and tend to be self-contained with few pedestrian connections to surrounding neighborhoods.

Mall types

In the U.S. and Canada, strip malls usually range in size from 5000 square feet (464.5 m²) to over 100000 square feet (9,290.3 m²). The smaller variety is more common and often located at the intersection of major streets in residential areas; it caters to a small residential area. This type of strip mall is found in nearly every city or town in the U.S. and Canada; it is service-oriented and may contain a grocery store

Grocery store

A grocery store is a store that retails food. A grocer, the owner of a grocery store, stocks different kinds of foods from assorted places and cultures, and sells these "groceries" to customers. Large grocery stores that stock products other than food, such as clothing or household items, are...

, video

Video

Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...

 rental store

Rental shop

A rental shop, also known as a video library, is a business that allows a consumer to temporarily obtain a reusable good or product for a specified period of time in exchange for payment, a process known as renting...

, dry cleaner, small restaurant

Restaurant

A restaurant is an establishment which prepares and serves food and drink to customers in return for money. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services...

, and similar stores. In the past, pharmacies

Pharmacy

Pharmacy is the health profession that links the health sciences with the chemical sciences and it is charged with ensuring the safe and effective use of pharmaceutical drugs...

 were often located next to the grocery stores, but are now often contained within the grocery store. One third of supermarkets currently have pharmacies. Gas stations, bank

Bank

A bank is a financial institution that serves as a financial intermediary. The term "bank" may refer to one of several related types of entities:...

s, and other businesses also may have their own free-standing buildings in the parking lot of the strip center. A recent trend is for grocery stores to have bank branches and gourmet coffee houses inside the store.

The other variety of strip mall in the U.S. is usually anchored

Anchor store

In retail, an anchor store, draw tenant, anchor tenant, or key tenant is one of the larger stores in a shopping mall, usually a department store or a major retail chain....

 on one end by a big box retailer, such as Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...

, Kohl's

Kohl's

Kohl's Corporation is an American department store chain headquartered in the Milwaukee suburb of Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, operating , 1,089 stores in 49 states. In 1998, it entered the S&P 500 list, and is also listed in the Fortune 500...

 or Target

Target Corporation

Target Corporation, doing business as Target, is an American retailing company headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It is the second-largest discount retailer in the United States, behind Walmart. The company is ranked at number 33 on the Fortune 500 and is a component of the Standard & Poor's...

, and by a large supermarket on the other. They are usually referred to as power centers in the real estate development industry because they attract and cater to residents of an expanded population area. The categories of retailers may vary widely, from electronics stores

Consumer electronics

Consumer electronics are electronic equipment intended for everyday use, most often in entertainment, communications and office productivity. Radio broadcasting in the early 20th century brought the first major consumer product, the broadcast receiver...

 to bookstores to home improvement stores

Home improvement

Home improvement, home renovation or remodeling is the process of renovating or making additions to one's home.-Types of home improvement:...

. There are typically only a few of this type of strip malls in a city, compared to the smaller types. Retailers vary from center to center, ranging from three or four large retailers to a dozen or more.

Some strip malls are hybrids of these types.

Architectural styles

Strip malls vary widely in architecture. Older strip malls tend to have plain architecture with the stores arranged in a straight row, though L-shaped configurations are not uncommon. Newer strip malls are often built with elaborate architecture to blend in with the neighborhood and to attract the upscale consumer. In some cases, strip malls are broken up into smaller buildings to establish a more appropriate sense of scale and to create architectural articulation. A current trend with the purpose of screening the parking lot from the street and nearby residences is locating the buildings with little to no setback from the street. Some stores may allow for entrances from both the street sidewalk and the parking lot.

See also

• Retail park
  Retail park
  In the United Kingdom, a retail park is a grouping of many retail warehouses and superstores with associated car parking. Its North American equivalent is a power centre. Retail parks are found on the fringes of most large towns and cities in highly accessible locations and are aimed at households...
  
  , a UK term for a grouping of retail stores, usually the equivalent of a power center.

External links

• In Defense of Strip Malls by Brad Edmonds.
• Localcenters Commercial Strip Mall Reference Site