Central Planning Backfires on Chinese Retail Center (economic, financial, world)

[NewToCA]

Unlike the USA, China does practically all of their development from a central blueprint.

To show their economic might, they built the largest shopping mall in the world three years ago. It isn't doing very well, so much for central planning:

"The South China Mall, which opened with great fanfare in 2005, is not just the world’s largest. With fewer than a dozen stores scattered through a space designed to house 1,500, it is also the world’s emptiest – a dusty, decrepit complex of buildings marked by peeling paint, dead light bulbs, and dismembered mannequins.

It’s odd to find a store with an actual person in it, like S-Square, a small, stylish clothing store with black-painted walls. Its 21-year-old shop assistant, Miss Chen, said business wasn’t so bad back when the mall first opened. Rent was then 10,000 yuan, but it’s no longer collected...She gets “one or two” customers a day, and passes the hours reading magazines and sending text messages to her friends.


Mall of misfortune - The National Newspaper

[katzenfreund]

Maybe they need to consult a feng shui expert?

[NewToCA]

I'd love to see the financial justification (business case) for this project. I wonder what they will do if it continues to remain so vacant, would they mandate retailers to occupy stores just to fill the mall?

I know we have dead malls here too, but nothing close to this fast nor this size.

[katzenfreund]

I can't believe they actually pay people to work in these stores. And it said the rent has not been collected.....amazing! The place did look really drab...not very inviting!