What's Next?

When a mall goes dark, a community loses more than just a place to shop and grab a slice of pizza at the food court's Sbarro. In many neighborhoods, the mall is an economic engine, hiring hundreds, if not thousands, of workers and providing a significant amount of dollars to the local tax base.

Malls and shopping centers across the country provide $400 billion in local tax revenue annually, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers, the retail real estate industry's trade group. And there are about 1,000 malls — both privately and publicly held — still operating in the U.S. today, according to commercial real estate services firm Green Street Advisors. 

The acceleration of e-commerce, along with a shift toward more consumers wanting to live downtown instead of the suburbs, has led to fewer people frequenting malls over the years. And as the pandemic hit, malls were boarded up, along with the stores in them. Some, including the Northgate Mall managed by Northwood Retail in Durham, North Carolina, are now closing for good. Former department store executive Jan Kniffen has predicted a third of America's malls will vanish by 2021.