On December 9, 2024, the Vientiane City in Xi ‘an, which has been attracting much attention, officially opened its doors to welcome guests in a heavyweight way of "year-end finale".
▲ Xi’ an Vientiane City (Photo: Network)
From the spectacular debut of Vientiane City in Shenzhen in 2004, to the fact that Shenyang Vientiane City almost rewrote the heavy luxury pattern in Northeast China with sales of 8.5 billion yuan, and then landed in Wuhan, Fuzhou and Haikou in 2022, in the past 20 years, "Vientiane City" has become a phenomenal existence. Whenever a new version of Vientiane City opens, it can always make countless people imagine.
Under such a background, the magnificent appearance of Xi ‘an Vientiane City, which is located at the core of the central axis of the "Long Mai" in Xi ‘an City and is crowned with the halo of "The 30th Anniversary of the Founding of China Resources Land and the 20th Anniversary of Vientiane Business", is destined to be different.
The only reason is that new people laugh, and who hears old people cry? When new business districts such as wanda plaza, SKP, Joy City, Vientiane City and the legendary Taikooli entered Xi ‘an in succession, it was behind the increasingly harsh living environment of traditional shopping malls.
01
Theoretically speaking, there is no shortage of shopping malls and business districts in Xi ‘an. Apart from the reputation and attractions accumulated by this brand in the past 20 years, the most important thing is whether it can continuously bring higher-grade resources and more "freshness" to Xi ‘an.
These two items are exactly what traditional shopping malls lack.
▲ Minsheng Department Store, the representative of Xi ‘an traditional shopping mall (Photo: Network)
In the early years, the pattern of business circle in Xi ‘an was still "East Rehabilitation Road, West Tumen, South Xiaozhai, North Daming Palace and China Jiefang Road". Now when it comes to the business district in Xi ‘an, most people’s first reaction has become TV Tower, High-tech Zone, Fengcheng No.7 Road, Datang City that Never Sleeps, and so on. Traditional shopping centers such as Minsheng, Parkson, Zhongda International and Century Golden Flower have gradually become the tears of the times. Young people prefer new business districts such as Wanda and Laochenggen or large supermarkets such as IKEA and Metro, and the front line of old shopping malls is constantly falling.
Take the once "top flow" Jiefang Road business circle as an example. Within a block less than one kilometer, six shopping malls were gathered at the peak. Now, however, the collective has fallen into a low tide:
Yuehui Plaza, which opened in September 2018, is now only left with cinemas, Internet cafes and several restaurants. Almost all the shops have been withdrawn, not only the lights have dimmed, but even the elevators have stopped. The first floor of Wulukou Minsheng has been completely closed, and the second to fifth floors are occupied by Meituan and Xueersi Online School. It is not so much a "shopping mall" as a "training institution" now. Suning.cn Square has been completely closed, and is now undergoing a comprehensive renovation under the banner of transforming into "Qin Chuangyuan Digital Economy Industrial Park". Tengyue Plaza now only has the box horse, Ruixing, Yikang and other stores on the first floor, which is barely a sense of sight as a "shopping mall", while the top floors have basically become medical beauty and New Oriental. ……
▲ Xi ‘an Tengyue Plaza (Photo: Network)
Since 2022, the new urban area has begun to transform the Jiefang Road business circle as a key project, but from the current situation, the effect does not seem obvious.
02
Apart from Jiefang Road, other business districts also have their own problems.
The traditional shopping malls such as chicony and Dayang Department Store in the Bell Tower have now run away, basically becoming Hanfu bases and food blocks; Besides the Golden Flower of the Century, the World Trade Center, Yahe International Cultural Plaza and Wanyu Gold Coast of the four corners of the "Golden Cross" project on Fengcheng Fifth Road have all fallen into the confusion of "unfinished"; Daming Palace, Wanda, Baihuan and Sihai Chinatown in Taihua Road Business Circle of the North Second Ring Road look magnificent, but their popularity is always half red and not purple.
▲ Core tube of Building 1 of Xi ‘an World Trade Center (Photo: China Real Estate News)
The opening of the new "track" began in 2018. In May of that year, the second SKP in China landed in Xi ‘an, and Xi ‘an’s luxury consumption entered a new era. Compared with Century Golden Flower’s ridicule that "people are either rich or poor who pretend to be rich", the sales of SKP in Xi ‘an in 2022 and 2023 are 9.5 billion and 8 billion, which proves that people in Xi ‘an now have considerable "hard power" in high-end consumption.
Everyone has money, and their eyes are naturally high. The construction direction of urban business circle has also become the introduction of new "major shareholders". Traditional shopping malls, which are mainly located in the middle and low end, naturally become the objects of "upward compatibility".
The dilemma faced by the old shopping centers is not limited to Xi ‘an, but mostly the whole country: in 2015, there were 47,000 people in the national shopping centers; By 2023, it has become 20,000, a drop of more than 60%.
Wangfujing, the largest retail giant of China department stores, only brushed out a total business volume of RMB 12.22 billion in 2023, but in 2019, not far ahead, this figure was still 26.79 billion, which can only be described as a yellow flower tomorrow and a bleak evening scene;
Wushang Group, the leader of shopping malls in Hubei, has a revenue of only 6.7 billion yuan in recent years, which is almost "halved" compared with the peak period;
▲ Wangfujing Department Store (Photo: Network)
In April, 2024, Shanghai CityShop, an old-fashioned boutique supermarket in Shanghai with a history of nearly 30 years, was dissolved due to the increasingly "difficult" and "unsustainable" operation, and all stores stopped operating on the same day.
In recent years, no matter the big cities like Beishangguangshen and Shenzhen or the small counties outside the 18th Line, there are news that traditional shopping malls with a history of more than ten years or even decades have withdrawn from the historical stage: Isetan Department Store in Meilong Town of Shanghai, over the rainbow Shopping Mall in Shenzhen, Wangfujing in Jianghan Road of Wuhan, Parkson in Xi ‘an West Street ……………………………………………………………………..
03
Traditional shopping malls are becoming more and more difficult to mix, partly because domestic shopping malls are too "rolled".
According to statistics, by the end of 2023, the "per capita shopping center area" of most cities in China has reached or exceeded 2 square meters. In contrast, the per capita shopping center area in Japan and South Korea is about 1 square meter, while that in China and Hong Kong is 1.5 square meters. However, this data in mainland China is still based on the huge population base far exceeding that in Japan and South Korea. This shows how many shopping malls there are in China.
▲ Empty shelves of an old supermarket
Nowadays, most people want to go shopping without going too far. Basically, they just go out. Shopping centers are still expanding wildly, but there are so many people, and the demand for "offline consumption" is relatively limited, so shopping malls have entered the phenomenon of "oversupply".
On the other hand, the highly developed e-commerce has dealt a huge and even fatal blow to traditional shopping malls. In the face of three-day discount and five-day promotion on the e-commerce platform, it is always the fracture price of "full XXX MINUS XXX". Who will be interested in the original price goods in the physical store? No one’s money is blown by the strong wind. Hard work, simplicity and thrift have always been the traditional virtues of the Chinese nation. If you can buy cheap ones, why buy expensive ones?
As a result, the nature of the old-fashioned shopping malls in the eyes of modern people has basically become a "fitting room": choose your favorite brand, size and color, turn your head and input the same parameters in a certain treasure, and then win it at the lowest price of 60% or even 50% off the shopping mall. It’s delicious.
Of course, similar dilemmas also exist for new shopping districts, so the presence of retail sector has been increasingly diluted in emerging large-scale shopping districts, and catering and entertainment have occupied a higher proportion. The Research Report on Shopping Center Switches in 2022-2024 of China Chain Store & Franchise Association provides a set of data: among the 447 shopping centers sampled in the survey, the number of catering shops has increased from 20,200 in 2022 to 2024.
▲ Catering shops in large shopping malls (Photo: Network)
Shopping malls are transforming into "canteens", which is the general trend now. Even luxury shopping malls can’t avoid customs. No matter Beijing SKP, the "king of global luxury stores", or Vientiane City and Taikooli, which have blossomed in recent years, they have basically set aside 15% ~ 25% for catering.
Therefore, the daily shopping activities of contemporary people, especially young people, basically become a cup of milk tea, a meal and a movie, while those traditional shopping malls have everything, but they just can’t provide these.
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From Xi ‘an to the whole country, many traditional supermarkets, represented by Jiefang Road shopping district, have started to "save themselves". However, under the background of more and more shopping centers, it can’t be said that there is no result, but it also has little effect. Although it has attracted some enterprises to settle in, it can only be regarded as "a small step" at most.
▲ Xi’ an People’s Paradise Commercial Street (Photo: Network)
On the one hand, there are nearly 6,700 shopping centers in China with a building area of over 30,000 square meters; On the one hand, retail sales are shrinking day by day, people’s consumption demand is getting higher, and the functionality of traditional shopping malls is constantly being replaced by emerging "superiors". Most of the traditional shopping malls have become "model" works mass-produced on the assembly line. The interior is basically the same, copied and pasted, and there is nothing new. Naturally, it is difficult to attract young people as the main consumer groups. Therefore, "shopping malls around without buying anything" has become a mainstream. Many shopping malls look crowded, but most of them use it as a "social background board".
The dilemma of traditional shopping malls is essentially the trend of the times, and can not be saved by the so-called "transformation".
This is the cruel reality: with the landing of Vientiane City in Xi ‘an, many nostalgic people began to worry about "how can so many shopping malls compete in the future?"-but the fact is that Vientiane City may not regard you as rivals at all, and people only have SKP in their eyes.
Source/Today Xi ‘an