The South China Mall in Dongguan is, hands down, the largest shopping mall on the face of the planet. The mall is over 7,000,000 square feet in size and has space for almost 1,500 stores. Sounds like a shopping addict’s dream come true, right? Sure - but there’s a problem.

The South China Mall, with space for hundreds of shops, currently houses 12 stores. That’s right, folks - 12 individual stores. Not 120; not 1,200; but a mere 12. The mall is over 99% empty.

It seems strange that one would plan and develop such a large site without arranging for occupants first, but China has been working hard to make the Pearl River Delta one of the world’s most memorable destinations. They already house the largest set of train tracks, the largest airport terminal, and the longest golf course. A gigantic mall would, theoretically, fit the model.

World’s Biggest Mall Features

The mall was built with a number of incredible features. There’s an amusement park complete with a roller coaster and an indoor rain forest. There are also a handful of replicas designed to make you feel as though you aren’t in a mall, including a Venetian canal, the Arc de Triomphe, and Venice’s St. Mark Square. You’ll even find a picnic area and a haunted house!

The problem is that the only people visiting are the employees, and the novelty of working in the world’s largest mall has already worn off. Take a quick stroll through the occupied sections of the mall and you’ll find employees doing whatever they want - sleeping, folding origami, reading, and staring blankly into space. There is simply nothing else to do but sit around and get paid for it.

Big Mall Competition

At the time the mall was built, there was fierce competition amongst some of the world’s top developers. Each wanted to build the largest mall, and every single time a large mall opened it would be surpassed by another after only a few short years. The Mall of the Emirates opened three years ago. The Dubai Mall will open in 2008, and the Mall of Arabia will open in 2010, each larger than the previous. All three of these malls combined total 10-million square feet, compared to the South China Mall’s individual 7-million. Each one will compete to have not only the largest space, but the best amenities. We’re talking trams, amusement parks, picnic areas, zoos, and more - all stuffed within the confines of the mall property.

To be different, the South China Mall split itself into seven unique sections, each of which was supposed to be designated to resemble a different area of the world. The individual sections were decorated in an authentic manner meant to convince visitors that they were actually in an exotic hot spot: Moscow, Paris, Venice, and Amsterdam amongst them.

There was much fanfare before the opening of the South China Mall. It was featured in The New York Times and in other major publications across the globe. Instead, the mall lies unfinished. Most of the storefronts are empty shells - a shop owner couldn’t move in if he wanted to right now. Entire sections of the malls remain half complete, with missing walkways and handrails. Visitors are blocked from these sections by security guards.

On the upside, Amazing World, the outdoor amusement park attached to the mall, seems to get a steady flow of visitors on a daily basis. Granted, we’re talking dozens of visitors as opposed to any sort of profitable number. School buses bring small groups of children to play and a few locals may explore the park as well. None, however, seem particularly enthused and very few even consider venturing inside the mall itself.

Problems with the South China Mall

So what really went wrong? The design and development of the mall apparently took prevalence over writing a strong business plan or model. Developers and investors were more interested in creating the largest mall and seemed to forget about soliciting tenants to fill the space. The plan just wasn’t thought through. As a matter of fact, the only reason the tenants that exist now are still there is because the mall is giving them free rent in order to entice them to stay while they try to figure out how to fill the rest of the dust-gathering monstrosity.

The other problem is the economy. The people of China don’t have the largest incomes in the world, but they’re very smart about the way they spend their money. At the time the mall was built, it seemed as though the Chinese were beginning to embrace and enjoy shopping, but it now looks as though this wasn’t really the case. Chinese people don’t buy as much junk as people everywhere else in the world - they actually save their pennies (almost 30% of their income, in some cases) for a rainy day!

Real estate investors claim that retail projects are difficult to develop. It’s a catch-22 situation. No one wants to sign a lease if they aren’t sure that the location will be filled, but the locations will never be occupied if no one signs a lease. All that we can do now is sit back, watch, and wait as the owners of the South China Mall reevaluate their situation and attempt to revamp their business model into something workable.

Until then, the South China Mall will remain, as The National titled it, “The mall of misfortune” That sounds about right to me.

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