On the surface, Valley Fair shopping mall is a very pleasant mall to shop at and a fun place to spend weekend time. Is is definitely one of San Jose's favorite malls. Valley Fair has many attributes that make it what it is. For example, the architecture, especially the “street lamp-like” wall lamps, pillars, modern chandeliers and use of warm colors conveys a feeling that you are walking through/shopping in a classy and almost European district. The food court is quite diverse and offers food of many different cultures. Most of the shops are well-decorated and advertised, and there is a lot of room for window shopping. With some exceptions, most of the shops are welcoming.
After some observation, however, after I looked closely at distribution of stores, I found that a lot of them were primed for the “upper class.” Looking at the big picture, with the plethora of super high-end stores like Louis Vuitton, Valley Fair may not be suitable for everyone. With a per capita income of only around $34,000 versus the $47,000 US average, San Jose is definitely not one of the “richest” cities around. Valley Fair is one of the most popular shopping centers in San Jose, yet it is somewhat limited to the upper class. Although one can argue that people who can't afford to shop at Valley Fair go elsewhere, the fact that a large fraction of the mega mall almost seems to be tuned to keep people out except for the elite should be challenged.
If the primary goal of shopping malls is profit, then why is there kind of division in people that Valley Fair seems to be promoting? Aside from having mostly high-end stores, the type of stores that exist also seem to represent “white” culture (this can maybe be attributed to the stores themselves) by having advertisements and models featuring physically “fit” white men and skinny white women. I don't know if this statistically attracts bigger profits, but with only 31.8% of the San Jose population being white, it is problematic that Valley Fair tries to set a standard for what's beautiful and maybe even “superior.” Unfortunately, the food court is the only “diverse,” place within the mall.
It would probably improve both Valley Fair's popularity if more the ratio between relatively inexpensive brands and expensive brands was made higher. Diversity of visitors to better represent San Jose's population spread can be increased there were more stores that originate/feature people of various cultural backgrounds (especially hispanic and asian) and body image. The main benefit of these changes would be to change the image of/do away with “social hierarchy” and to help promote a society without rankings based on how wealthy someone is or what race or culture people belong to.
