Fashion Place Mall’s latest growth is reflected in both its occupancy and its reported performance: mall executives say the Murray center added 55,000 square feet of retail space and has just one vacant storefront, while traffic rose 8% and sales increased 13% year over year. New arrivals range from a British chocolatier to a clothing brand popular on TikTok, as the mall looks to draw shoppers through the holidays and beyond.
Traffic and Sales Climbing Ahead of the Holidays
GGP executive vice president of retail and leasing Kirsten Lee gave The Salt Lake Tribune the mall’s year-over-year figures: “traffic here is up 8% year-over-year, and sales are up 13%.” Lee said the center has been “crushing it since 1972” and that interest persisted as online shopping grew. Senior general manager Mark Thorsen told the Tribune that Fashion Place added 55,000 square feet of retail space and has one vacancy. Lee called last year the mall’s biggest holiday shopping season yet, and Thorsen said he expects this holiday season to be busier.
Newer additions include Alo, a California-based premium athletic-wear retailer, and Garage, a Canadian casual-apparel brand focused on young women's clothing, the Tribune reported. Longtime anchors Lululemon and Hollister have also recently remodeled and reopened with larger footprints. Thorsen said Fashion Place aims to serve shoppers ranging from seniors — the mall still draws mall-walker groups that skew older — to Gen Alpha.
A British Chocolatier Makes Its Utah Debut
Among the freshest arrivals is Hotel Chocolat, a luxury chocolate chain that started in the U.K. and emphasizes ethically sourced, less-sugary treats. Store manager Alex Tran told the Tribune it is the brand's first location in Utah, with the store opening this month and a grand opening planned for mid-November. Separately, Hotel Chocolat's own announcement, posted on its website, said the Fashion Place store would open as part of a late-fall 2026 push that also includes new locations in Long Beach, California, and Alexandria, Virginia. The company has been developing a cafe format called the Velvetiser, serving iced cacao drinks and cacao-infused baked goods meant to extend its appeal beyond the colder months, according to industry outlet Cocoa Radar.
Also new is Miniso, a Chinese household-and-consumer-goods store that opened its first Utah location inside Fashion Place, the Tribune reported. Pop Mart, known for selling the viral plush toy Labubu, opened a store at the mall in 2025, and Thorsen said the line to get in stretched to Dillard's, out the door, and over to the Container Store.
More Trendy Names on the Way
Fashion Place isn't done adding shops. Edikted, a clothing retailer popularized on TikTok and geared toward Gen Z, is set to open next May, and Thorsen said he anticipates very large lines for its debut. Kendra Scott and Rothy's are also planned to open within the next year, per the Tribune's reporting. Rothy's, which started as a direct-to-consumer brand, sells washable knit shoes made with recycled materials along with other goods.
Lee told the Tribune that Fashion Place’s core shoppers are generally women with higher incomes, from their mid-20s to mid-40s. She said social media has influenced local fashion tastes, with both ultra-trendy and more-modest retailers succeeding at the mall. Lee also pointed to company focus groups suggesting that isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic contributed to renewed interest in shopping in person. The Tribune reported that GGP’s broader approach is to keep adding brands that attract shoppers.
Why Shoppers Keep Coming Back
Sherida Hosie, a West Jordan mother whose daughter is 14, told the Tribune that she visits an open-air mall every week or two but goes to an indoor mall such as Fashion Place about once every two months. She expects those visits to increase near the holidays. After suggesting her daughter invite a friend to Fashion Place about a month ago, Hosie has dropped her off there for several hangouts. On her own visits, Hosie is drawn to the Lego Store, Pop Mart, Lush and Miniso.
That kind of pattern lines up with a broader shift researchers have documented among younger shoppers. A 2023 ICSC survey found 60% of Gen Z respondents visit malls to socialize or meet friends even without a specific purchase in mind, and the same share said they'd rather spend money on experiences than material items, according to Modern Retail. A more recent ICSC and McKinsey & Company report, released in April, pointed to three forces reshaping physical retail — AI's growing role in shopping, rising expectations for transparency and convenience, and shifting consumer spending power — and found that younger generations increasingly prefer edited assortments, pop-ups and showroom-style formats, according to ICSC. That report also found more than 40% of Gen Z and millennial consumers said experiential retail makes them more likely to shop with a given retailer.
Fashion Place Fits a Statewide and National Pattern
Fashion Place’s reported gains come amid broader increases in mall visits. Placer.ai, a location analytics company that uses mobile-device data to track foot traffic, recorded year-over-year October visit increases of 5.8% at open-air malls and 4.1% at indoor malls, according to the Tribune. The Tribune also reported that higher-end, so-called Class A malls are generally outperforming more affordable competitors nationally.
That dynamic is playing out at other upscale properties too. The Mall at Short Hills in New Jersey saw second-quarter foot traffic rise 7.9% year over year and counts 150 tenants, including 50 described as unique to the mall in that state, Modern Retail reported in its look at thriving luxury malls. Bal Harbour Shops reported an 8.8% year-over-year increase in sales per square foot for mall stores as of May, according to its CEO. Modern Retail's reporting also found that luxury mall operators nationally are leaning on a mix of established and buzzy contemporary brands, plus dining and entertainment, to round out the visitor experience.
In a Tribune survey of readers’ mall habits, 96 people responded and 90 said they had visited a mall in the past year. Fashion Place was the most frequently named mall they had last visited, followed by City Creek Center. Fashion Place’s ability to refresh its mix has a longer history: in 2011, it was welcoming Utah’s first Cheesecake Factory and Sephora locations, along with new 20,000-square-foot Crate and Barrel and H&M stores, according to an archived Tribune report.
Earlier expansions reshaped the mall
The current additions follow earlier rounds of redevelopment. Deseret News reported in 2015 that Fashion Place had added 230,000 square feet of retail space over the preceding five years, including an expanded Nordstrom, an interior redesign and a larger food court. Murray City Planning Commission minutes from November 2016 also document a subdivision request to create a separate lot for a new Macy’s store then under construction at the mall.
