Big box chains and suburban shopping malls were doomed to fail. They built in a boom time and built in places expecting to draw in new development and residents from tens of miles away. But they based all their site decisions on an impractical urban development model (suburbs) that turns out to not work in reality, and they lost their drawing power to online retail. Smaller form-factor retailers are doing fine because they can easily go where the demand is and provide better service without making customers feel like cattle. The big box chains are realizing this and contracting to smaller stores more conveniently located to try to keep up with the market. They still have a price advantage and people are willing to walk or drive short distances to have goods now rather than wait a couple days for their Amazon Prime package. I hope the massive amount of equity tied up in the failing subsection can be transferred elsewhere though...