# Difference between Shopping Center, Plaza, and Strip Mall

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-shopping-center-plaza-and-strip-mall/720534>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 21, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-shopping-center-plaza-and-strip-mall/720534 "2015-05-21T18:04:37Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2019, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-shopping-center-plaza-and-strip-mall/720534/43 "2019-07-18T09:34:19Z")

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> [@Oswald\_Bastable](#):
>
> ETA: Many British shopping centres do use ‘mall’ as a marketing term, but I don’t think many punters actually use the term. It’s just an Americanism too far… 😉
> 
> OB

Also I think there is confusion over how to pronounce it - maybe not now, as the American term has become more familiar, but the street in London is pronounced to rhyme with “pal”, not “call”.

When I was younger we used to call it the “shopping precinct”. What Americans call a strip mall would be an “arcade”. (Although strictly speaking the latter term means a strip with a roof over the top.)

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**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2019, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-shopping-center-plaza-and-strip-mall/720534/44 "2019-07-18T10:25:51Z")

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To me, “strip mall” is merely a descriptor (usually pejorative) of a particular configuration of a shopping center—a line (could be L-shaped) of connected stores that open onto a common parking lot that faces the street.

Ordinarily you would just call it a shopping center, unless you wanted to emphasize its physicality, such as its ugliness—“oh it’s all strip malls now from here to Springfield.”

Except for the National Mall, “mall,” ordinarily means an enclosed mall.

“Plaza” has no particular meaning to me in this context. Some shopping centers have a plaza (the entrances open on to a common gathering area rather than a parking lot) and some shopping centers use the word “plaza” in their names.

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**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\
**Post date:** [July 24, 2019, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/difference-between-shopping-center-plaza-and-strip-mall/720534/45 "2019-07-24T01:29:17Z")

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I just heard a podcaster say “mini mall.” He also said “strip mall” later. I don’t know if he meant them to mean the same thing.

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