At first glance it seems like a typical mall, but the Myrtle Beach Mall has added about a half a dozen non-retail tenants over the past year and a half.
This is a national trend and something their leasing manager says they do to make a trip to the mall more of an experience than just a spending trip.
Landon Thompson is one of those retailers. He opened Let's Go Racing in the mall a little more than a year ago and says business has been good.
"Being here in the mall puts me in front of thousands of people a week where if I was in a strip mall or a warehouse somewhere, it wouldn't be very good," he said.
"At first I do get some funny faces and questions but then once you explain it to them they go, oh I never thought about it before in a mall," Kim B. Dayvault, the mall's Specialty Leasing Manager says.
Just last week, a live game show called Scrambled Squares moved into a retail space. There's also Carolina Improv Company, a live improv theatre; Anaerobic, a fitness and art studio; an Ionic detox spa, and a model train club that lease space.
"We've been here over 15 months and we've had just over 40 thousand visitors come in," Ed Sharrett, the club's president said.
"The online shopping is always going to be a threat to local retail in general" Dayvault says.
She adds she worries about the threat of online shopping, especially for black Friday this year but many of those non-traditional tenants say they had their best business of the season that day.
