Suburban buildings can be bigger - and can more easily meet the standardized requirements of national merchandisers. The bigger a new building, the lower its square-foot costs for leasing. In smaller, downtown spaces, economies of scale are hard to obtain, and zoning may limit building heights. Also, corporate retailers tend to seek prototype rectangles with ample floor space. These are easier to provide on new, spacious suburban sites.
Parking is ample.
The more sprawled in size a suburban lot is, the more parking area it is likely to provide. A developer contrasted the typical construction costs of a suburban vs. a downtown office building. This analysis includes only construction costs, estimated per square foot. It does not include the costs of acquiring a site. A case study from the Town of Randolph offers a cost comparison for the proposed redevelopment of a supermarket - first on a downtown site, then at a shopping plaza outside the town center.