When we first moved to Aiken in 1989 to shop in an enclosed mall you had to drive to Augusta, but they were building one here that did open a couple years later. It took more than ten years past that to get the mainstay of mall-dom, GAP, to open up a store in it.
When they did open the store did a huge business, but it trailed of rather quickly. Last year after maybe 3 years of doing business they shut the doors. Don’t worry they told us, we are going to remodel and open up as a GAP Outlet. The “outlet” has been open for a few months and they really most have expected a huge swing in shoppers. There is one central cashier station at the back of the store and they have the nylon strap equivalent of velvet ropes in front of it that is two 15′ sections folded on each other, probably hold a dozen shoppers.
Admititly it was a Tuesday, but Donna and I plus another couple were the only shoppers in the store. We were outnumbered 3 to 1 by sales associates who mostly stood around behind the cashier’s station loudly trying to one up each other with retail job interview stories. Maybe the Saturday before Christmas they might get a dozen shoppers in the whole store, never mind checking out at the same time.