A Squeeze on Retailers Leaves Holes at Malls

"It was planned when the local real estate market was very hot, and now the Crossroads of Cresthill, a modest-size strip mall of 44,000 square feet in the Chicago suburbs, is almost completed. But the developer, Gierzyck Midwest, has managed to nail down only a couple of small tenants. The 10,000-square-foot anchor it hoped to land, Menards, a hardware retailer, was lost to another shopping center a mile away."