Randolph resident David Maier didn’t really want to shop at the Rockaway Townsquare mall.
It was only after his barber, Mario, moved into the mall from nearby Dover, one of Morris County’s primary downtowns, that he had a change of heart.
“I tell you what we end up doing is eating at the restaurants," Maier said. "I think that’s going to be a big draw.”
Retail hasn’t necessarily seen a decline after the COVID-19 pandemic, like some had feared.
On a recent morning this month, the Rockaway mall was relatively crowded for the time and day. And it grew more crowded as the lunch rush streamed into the central food court.
The mall also serves as a popular spot during lunch time for soldiers from the nearby Picatinny Arsenal, which is just an eight-minute drive away.
Rockaway Townsquare sits just off Interstate 80 and is visible from the highway. It also sits near Routes 46 and 15, the latter a critical artery offering passage through Sussex County.
The mall is the prime retail destination for hundreds of thousands of residents living across Sussex, Morris and Passaic counties.
The other nearest two malls are Willowbrook Mall in Wayne and The Mall at Short Hills in Essex County, both of which are roughly half an hour drive without traffic.
Of those three malls, Rockaway Townsquare saw the least foot traffic — 250,000 visitors in May — according to metrics from Placer.ai, a location data company.
Simon Property Group, which owns the Rockaway Townsquare, is a heavy hitter in the mall industry, said Charles Cristella, senior vice president of leasing at the real estate services firm JLL in Trenton.
“It has good tenants,” Cristella said of the mall at Rockaway. “Any mall that has an Apple [store] in it is not a bad mall.”
'Live, work, play': Redefining the mall
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, malls have focused on far more than retail, entering the realms of daily living, convenience, entertainment and residential development.
It’s what retail insiders have referred to as “live, work, play” — communities built to accommodate many different needs.
Think along the lines of apartment buildings going up at Garden State Plaza and Bergen Town Center, both in Paramus, a town with multiple malls.
“The owners of Rockaway will likely search for the best complement to the existing retail environment and community, whether that be hotel, residential, entertainment concepts, or something that is severely lacking in the market at present,” said Emily Arft, who sits on the retail research team for the commercial real estate analytics firm Green Street.
Rockaway Townsquare General Manager Erica Bennington said a residential component was not on the table, at least for now.
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“We have enough ‘live’ in the area,” she said. “So this is entirely a community-based center. So we’re focused on entertainment — and driving families into the center.”
One attraction opening soon is Xtreme Energy, an indoor playground and birthday venue featuring activities such as trampolines, rock climbing and a ropes course.
“It fits right into the mall model,” said one of the owners, Vic Segal.
And that mall model, Bennington said, is the experience of the mall.
Another experience at the mall is an arcade, known as Marcade Family Fun Center.
Picture your typical 1980s-style arcade with games like Asteroids, pinball, Galaga, Frogger and Donkey Kong.
“It seems like they’re leaning more into entertainment for families, because there’s a lot of online shopping, so we’re happy to be part of that, help them out any way that we can,” said one of the store managers, Josh James.
The idea behind Marcade, James continued, is a sense of nostalgia for the 40 and 50-something crowd; to bring along their kids or grandkids so they can also enjoy the entertainment of a bygone era.
“We’re trying to integrate in a younger crowd of people, to show them, ‘Hey these games are fun, you know, they’re different, they’re not Xbox series X, they’re not a Playstation,'” James said.
Of course, there are still traditional retail stores at Rockaway, and in-person shopping does have its benefits, especially on tight timelines or a customer wants to see how something looks or fits in person.
Two of Rockaway's anchor tenants — Sears and Lord & Taylor — shuttered their locations at the mall in 2020 as they closed stores throughout New Jersey in recent years.
Officials at Rockaway Townsquare did not say if they’ve been involved in talks on what would replace the two former anchor tenants, or what they would like to see at those locations.
“Simon cannot go in and immediately backfill or redevelop those vacancies, which is probably why the boxes have sat vacant for the past couple of years,” said Arft of Green Street. “Third-party ownership can sometimes delay value enhancing redevelopment initiatives at malls.”
Daniel Munoz covers business, consumer affairs, labor and the economy for NorthJersey.com and The Record.
Email:munozd@northjersey.com; Twitter:@danielmunoz100andFacebook
