Black Friday crowds sparse at S.F. malls

About 10 people had lined up outside the San Francisco Centre on Market Street to be among the first shoppers walking in when mall workers threw open the doors for Black Friday.

In years past, John and Michelle McGuire would leave their San Francisco home to head downtown, arriving at the mall before dawn and joining throngs of eager shoppers looking for deals only getable on this day.

But this year, the kids were grown and the best deals were online. So the McGuires waited in line for another reason — nostalgia.

“There’s a lot of history — that’s why I come back,” McGuire said.

At San Francisco’s premier shopping hubs, the jostling, deal-hungry crowds of a bygone Black Friday era were largely absent. The holiday trappings were there — adoptable puppies and kitties cuddling in the windows at Macy’s in Union Square; instrumental holiday tunes soaring from loudspeakers at Stonestown Galleria; and a Christmas tree festooned silver and gold ornaments soared above the entrance hall at the San Francisco Centre downtown. But relatively few shoppers showed up to enjoy them.

Hendra Hutama had only rung up two sales more than two hours into her shift at Bloomingdale’s, where she’s worked for 17 years at the San Francisco Centre. She expects the crowds to pick up in December, and in the meantime she was busy answering patron questions through the retailer’s website.

“The shopping experience is not what it used to be,” Hutama said.

This summer, mall owner Westfield gave up its namesake San Francisco mall under significant financial duress following the hollowing out of downtown due to the rise in remote work and the departure of key anchor tenants like Nordstrom’s. Renamed the San Francisco Centre, the mall is still struggling to bring patrons to Market Street.

At the Stonestown Galleria, shoppers flocked to Japanese homegoods store Daiso and Chinese retailer Miniso on Friday, while other stores like Sephora and Zara were relatively empty.

Like the former Westfield, Stonestown has in recent years lost key anchor stores, including Macy’s. But the mall has managed to pivot by bringing in Target and Whole Foods and stores popular among Asian American shoppers. Real estate giant Brookfield, which owns Stonestown, has told the Chronicle that foot traffic is above prepandemic levels from 2019, though the company received a 30-day extension to repay a $180 million loan on the property.

Tamisha Mouton, 49, came to Stonestown from Hayward to shop at a curated thrift store called 2nd Street. Not many years ago, finding a thrift store inside a mall would’ve been unimaginable, but as malls try to stay alive as online shopping has taken over, more stores like it are popping up.

While the mall’s main rotunda was bustling, the hallways elsewhere felt empty. A whole section of massage chairs stood empty next to a Taiwanese restaurant and a revolving sushi bar.

“I wish there were still more anchor stores,” Mouton said. “Now it seems like you have these small shops where you can get something unique or exclusive. But for Black Friday shopping, it doesn’t feel like a regular mall anymore.”

Meanwhile at Union Square, a stern officer was seen outside Macy’s checking the bags of a flustered woman who had just exited a nearby store. The commercial center has struggled with crime in recent years, and more than a dozen police officers patrolled the district early Friday to keep shoppers and workers safe.

Downtown San Francisco has struggled to regain a population of daytime workers and shoppers in part due to the popularity of remote work.

Linda Barry, a resident of Martinez across the bay in Contra Costa County, has been coming to Union Square on the Friday after Thanksgiving for more than 15 years. Sipping coffee during a shopping break, she said she was surprised by how few others had come to the city’s prime shopping district. Too many storefronts were vacant, she said.

“I thought it would be a lot more people, a little more crowded,” she said. “But I’m hearing different languages, so it seems that there are tourists out.”

Several Union Square store workers said they didn’t think shoppers felt safe walking around with big shopping bags due to reports of robberies and thefts in the area. Some stores have started holding customers’ bags with purchased items so they can continue shopping empty-handed.

Back at the San Francisco Centre, fashion student Stephanie Maldonado was on the hunt for new sneakers to add to her collection. Before moving to San Francisco two years ago, Maldonado used to go Black Friday shopping in South Carolina with her mother where they had fewer choices. She likes the pace of a quieter Black Friday and the variety of stores in the mall.

“I need to end the day with at least one (shopping) bag,” she said.

Reach Clare Fonstein: clare.fonstein@sfchronicle.com, reach Julie Johnson: julie.johnson@sfchronicle.com, reach Aldo Toledo aldo.toledo@sfchronicle.com, reach Laura Waxmann laura.waxmann@sfchronicle.com

Stephen Lam/The Chronicle Shoppers enter Macy’s in Union Square. At San Francisco’s premier shopping hubs, the large crowds of a bygone Black Friday era were largely absent this year.