Why don't more people shop downtown? An analysis of retailers, shoppers, and city policy
Creators: name: Garrison, Abby Studer
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2010

description: During the decades preceding the financial crash in 2008, many urban areas experienced significant regeneration, illustrated by population gains and new development in their urban cores. Many urban areas experienced growth for the first time in decades, reversing a decades-long trend of residential and commercial exodus to the suburbs. Clearly, downtowns are appealing to people and businesses in new ways. On the heels of the downtown housing renaissance of the early 2000s, downtown is back on retailers' radar after years of focusing predominately on suburbs and exburbs. However, real challenges to locating retail downtown continue to exist - on both the supply and demand side. While retailers are aware that opportunity exists downtown, they often choose not to pursue urban locations for many reasons, primarily driven by uncertainty about performance and execution of stores that are outside their traditional suburban model. On the demand side, while many consumers readily proclaim they would like to shop downtown, their daily actions suggest either a lack of conviction or lack of downtown shopping opportunity. The number of people living downtown is increasing, but the numbers are relatively small compared to those living in the suburbs. This paper seeks to understand why downtown retail remains sparse, and what - if anything - should be done to catalyze downtown retail. We will start with a brief history of what's been going on in downtowns in the past few decades. Across the country, cities have attempted to reinvent their downtowns, many of them focusing first increasing jobs downtown, then focusing on building downtown housing, with the idea that commercial development will follow people who work and live downtown. The financial crisis of 2008 hit just when many downtowns were gaining traction in downtown living. How and when the next step - attracting downtown retail - will occur remains largely uncertain given difficulties in credit markets and with the retail business in general. Next, we will report on the current status of retail site selection from the perspective of the retailers themselves. How do they pick where to locate stores? What is their decision-making process? This portion of the report will draw primarily from secondary research sources within the field. After looking at how retailers decide where to locate stores, we will analyze consumer attitudes and preferences regarding where they shop: downtown, in suburban shopping centers, and online. This portion of the report will be based on a survey I designed and deployed myself. The questions were based on a survey conducted in 1955 by C. T. Jonassen at Ohio State University entitled, "The Shopping Center versus Downtown: A Motivation Research on Shopping Habits and Attitudes in Three Cities." Many of my questions were inspired by the Jonassen survey, but have been updated based on economic and demographic changes over the past 50 years; additionally, all the Internet-based questions are entirely new. Finally, this report will conclude with recommendations on best practices to reinvigorate downtown retail. Its primary finding is that policy adjustments are needed: both internal retailer company policies and federal, state, and local public policies. Retailers need to adjust their location decision-making. Public policy makers need to rewrite public policies to better support downtown retail, rather than continue to give the advantage to suburban shopping centers.