Why do all malls always smell the same?

[Jonathan_Chance]

The odor of slow failure and late-stage capitalism?

[DesertDog]

@kenobi_65

My college girlfriend was an assistant manager at a Mrs. Field’s in a shopping mall. She told me that part of the store design was a blower which vented the air from the kitchen into the pedestrian area in front of the store, as the cookie scent was found to be a powerful lure. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if other shopping-mall mainstays which have strong olfactory components do much the same.

Way back in 1988 DesertWife and I during the presidential election season wanted to proselytize for the Libertatian candidate. The local mall let us set up in the court area at the end of an arm by one of the anchors and right next to it was the first Cinnabon we’d seen. I don’t know if they were blowing oven exhaust into the mall or not, but every twenty minutes we’d get hit with the smell when they pulled out a new batch. I swear snarfed up enough we were five pounds heavier when we stopped after a month.

[DrFidelius]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

It’s because there’s only one Mall, with different entrances across the nation. Savvy travelers know how to enter The Mall in Poughkeepsie and exit The Mall in Seattle. But I’ve already said too much.

Isn’t that The Maul?

[Nava]

No, it’s M-Space.

[PatriotX]

So, it’s not exactly just me.

But it’s not everybody.

[ftg]

Good malls smell all alike; every crappy mall reeks in its own way.
-Leo Tolstoy

[DB_Coopa]

Shopping malls and prison walls all look the same to me.

• Generic America by Blue Mountain.