The new Town Square "mega-mall" opened here in Las Vegas on November 14th. I took a trip down there to check it out for myself, and to talk to some people about what they liked or didn't like about the place. It has a downtown feel, and one woman I talked to even called it wholesome. Kind of strange considering its location, but I could definitely see why she felt that way.
The shopping center is next to Fry's Electronics (on the South end of Las Vegas Blvd.) and is kind of hard to get to. Here's a map. It's not entirely accurate because the satellite image on google hasn't been update yet, but at least it will give you an idea of where to go.
Town Square was surprisingly quiet when I visited, but one shopper I talked to said she had visited on the weekend during the day, and the place was packed. She was from out of town, visiting with her family, and she decided to bring her son back on a weekday to have a photo take with Santa, because the line had been too long on the weekend.The whole shopping center is decorated for Christmas of course, and there's an exhibit of statues making Norman Rockwell magazine covers and artwork 3-D. Here are some pictures and a link to more information on the Norman Rockwell exhibit:
I talked to Michael (pictured on left) from Fruits and Passion, a store that originally began in Canada, but has four U.S. locations now that the one in Town Square is open. When I came in, the store was completely empty but Michael said even though it looked slow, they met their corporate sales goals every night since the grand opening. He blamed the slow business at night on the "nippy" weather, but thinks that things will pick up once all the stores at Town Square open and it gets a little warmer.
There seemed to be a lot of cars in Town Square when I went, but it was pretty dead considering its location and how new everything is. I figured most people were in eating at Claim Jumper or something, but then I saw the line for Santa. There was a little house where kids could go sit on Santa's lap and have their picture taken, and that little house was packed. Plus there was a huge line for it.
The nice thing about having a shopping center like this open around this time of year is that a ton of jobs are opening up right when people need them the most. A girl I talked to works at Target now, and she decided to go look at Town Square to try and find a new job before Christmas. She said there were almost too many options, so she picked up about half a dozen applications and is working on those now. She said that her Target store (on Maryland and Flamingo) hasn't been affected at all by the new shopping center, but she did say that Boulevard Mall will probably take a hit this season.
Here are some pictures I took. Make sure you click on "The Las Vegas Wash" link below to see some more pictures my fellow classmate Rob Ponte took.
Video footage of opening and visitors:
