UIS 3912 Independent Study Module, Semester 2 (AY 2010 / 2011)

Zelig Dhi Lee

UIS 3912 Independent Study Module

The Greening of Singapore’s Shopping Malls: How Green is City

Square Mall?

By:

Zelig Dhi Lee Bai Hong

Department of Geography
University Scholars Programme
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
U070288U

And supervised by:

Dr Victor Savage
Associate Professor
Department of Geography
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
National University of Singapore

Abstract:

Despite a city filled with numerous shopping malls, there are surprisingly few shopping malls
in Singapore which have followed environmentally friendly building practices. City Square
Mall is marketed by its developer as Singapore’s first “Eco-Mall”. Using a combination of
information from the developer, tenants and customer attitudes, this paper aims to
investigate how City Square Mall has effectively and successfully portrayed itself as an “Eco-
mall” from the marketing and operational perspective. Empirical investigations reveal
mixed results where the mall’s identity as an “Eco-Mall” is largely perpetuated by the
developer, anchor and niche tenants; yet being subverted by the silent majority of small
tenants as well as the general public due to inadequate resources and education; resulting
in much uncertainty over the mall’s long term sustainability and identity as an “Eco-mall”.

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The Greening of Singapore’s Shopping Malls: How Green is City Square Mall?

Fig. 1. Panorama View of City Square Mall (Source: CSM Website)

Introduction

City Square Mall (CSM, see Fig. 1) is a shopping mall that is situated in Little India, a major
heritage district in Downtown Singapore. CSM is developed by a major Singaporean developer, City
Developments Limited (CDL) on the former site of the New World Amusement Park situated at the
junctions of Kitchener and Serangoon Roads. The mall is located near the popular Mustafa Centre
and various heritage shophouses and is easily served by the Farrer Park MRT station and various bus
services. CSM first had its soft opening in November 2009 and was officially opened in March 2010.
The mall is widely marketed by CDL as Singapore’s first “Eco-Mall” for its environmentally-friendly
and its immense energy-conservation features (CDL website). CSM’s innovative and creative design
has been recognized by both the Government and the Real Estate Industry, as reflected in CSM
being the first mall to be given the highly prestigious Green Mark Platinum Award by Singapore’s
Building and Construction Authority (BCA) in 2007; as well as CDL receiving the Cityscape Asia Real
Estate Award for Best Developer (Future) in 2008. One year on, the mall continues to aggressively
market itself as an environmentally and community-friendly especially with a strong focus on young
children as part of CDL’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and environmental education policies.
Though the mall has effectively sustained itself as an attractive mall for visitors and tenants alike, the
challenges of sustaining the mall as both commercially viable and environmentally sustainable
appears immense; for diverging interpretations and responses by CDL, its tenants and shoppers

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result in contestations over the relevance of the environmental message vis-à-vis adhering to the
traditional and commercial retail management strategies.

This paper aims to pursue two main key issues – firstly, to what extent has CSM’s identity as
an “Eco-Mall” been endorsed by both shoppers and tenants; and how far does CSM’s tenants
support or subvert CDL’s marketing strategy of CSM as an “Eco-Mall” through their shops’ general
operations and marketing of their respective products. I will argue that CDL faces significant
challenges in seeking and sustaining visitors and tenants’ endorsement to a large extent especially
its customer base and visitors. In addition, anchor tenants and minority niche tenants selling
exclusively eco-friendly products play a very dominant and proactive role in supporting CDL’s efforts
in sustaining CSM’s identity; though potentially and largely subverted by the silent majority of
smaller retailers who largely do not subscribe or implement environmentally-sustainable retailing
efforts as encouraged by the management. This paper will first review academic literature on
sustainable retail marketing and management, followed by a detailed presentation and analysis of
CSM’s tenant mix and good operating practices. Lastly, this paper seeks to propose future policy and
management strategies that both developers and retailers can consider to adopt to further sustain
and strengthen sustainable retail management.

Methodologies employed in this paper include general observations of the mall’s features
and its tenants; with primary evidence collected from CSM’s collaterals. Semi-structured interviews
with the CSM management and selected tenants were conducted while secondary evidence
collected from newspaper articles and the internet were perused as part of the research process.
However, some challenges arose during the research process. Firstly, many prospective corporate
interviewees were either declined or did not respond to my request to share their management
insights, motivations or challenges in setting up shop in CSM. This means that the corporate
perspective presented are more observational and secondary in nature as opposed to the desired
empirical approach, and perhaps less comprehensive due to lack of data with respect to customer
flows and earnings from eco-friendly products. Secondly, the limited timeline and resources of this
project meant that I could not actively solicit insights from shoppers themselves which would have
made this project more-informed than I would prefer. In addition, the inability to source for suitable
statistical data related to energy consumption and visitor flows which are likely to be confidential or
inaccessible information means that I cannot employ quantitative analysis to analyze potential
trends in such areas to make the research more complete and comprehensive.

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Sustainable Retail Marketing and Management

Sustainable Retail Marketing and Management is a relatively new niche area which covers
an interdisciplinary field of retail geographies and management studies. Though there has been
rigorous academic studies in the areas of geography and real estate in retail development and
management, literature which focuses on sustainable retail management remains significantly
scarce. Studying governmental and corporate policies towards green buildings is a basic prerequisite
to studying sustainable retail marketing and management. CSM gained prominence first and
foremost as a high energy-efficient building and this undergirds its green retail attraction. Brandon &
Lombardi (2011) argue that the green building concept and discourse has evolved in tangent with
the growing prominence and study of sustainable development especially from the 1970s. They cite
the Global Green Building Trends SmartMarket Report (2008) of governments putting green
buildings as an important environmental issue. Such government policies gained priority by
architects, while developers and tenants rank the last with respect to perceiving the importance of
green buildings. Brandon & Lombardi (2011: 17) succinctly highlights that moral rather than
commercial or practical motivations is the most important factor in encouraging the development
and proliferation of green buildings. Hence the demand for green buildings is largely shaped by
public opinion. As such, they call for a holistic and integrated framework for sustainable building
development and management involving 15 modal aspects which includes physical, economic,
spatial and social factors involving a broad-based of stakeholders from the state, developer to
society. Doak (2009) complements Brandon & Lombardi’s (2011) arguments by further highlighting
how the emerging climate change discourse has accelerated the development of green buildings,
where he cites four critical factors being holistic inter-relationships, resource flows, long-term
impacts and stakeholder participation as relevant in shaping the green building discourse especially
from the developer’s perspective.

Sustainable retail development is significantly inter-linked with corporate policies to

complement CSR strategies especially with respect to environmental management. This is largely
because buildings have been proven to have significant environmental impacts, where Doek (2009)
cites a UNEP report showing that the built environment accounting for 40% of global greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions, 30% of solid waste generation and 40% of global energy use. Major developers
globally are actively consolidating their CSR and environmental policies such as aiming for the
internationally-recognized ISO 14001 which sets environmental standards for corporations to follow.
Walker (2008: 121) highlights that such corporations are increasingly embracing the concept of
‘triple bottom line’ reporting being financial, environmental and social performance in an effort to

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boost their corporate responsibility credentials to their stakeholders being investors, consumers,
employees and local communities. Newell (2009) highlights that several property developer
companies across the world are highly represented in various international sustainability landmarks,
such as the Dow Jones World Sustainability Index (DJWSI) and the London FTSE4Good Index, where
he cites Land Securities as rated the top company in the property sub-sector and top in the broader
financial services sector of the DJWSI. Hence, corporations especially those in the property and
building sectors strive to enhance their corporate image aggressively to go in tangent with the larger
national governmental rhetoric of forging sustainable urban management, in a bid to sustain their
high profitability and marketability as a response to increasing state and societal demands for the
provision of green goods and services.

Greening retail landscapes poses a greater challenge to property developers and managers
as opposed to the relatively straightforward physical-based approach of constructing green buildings,
in which forging an effective tenant mix and visitor environment in marketing environmentally
friendly products in their shops is a relevant aspect of an “Eco-Mall”. Doak (2009) calls for
sustainable retail development and management that takes into account the opportunities and
dynamics of the real estate developmental processes; calling for a framework that emphasizes
diverse stakeholder participation as well as a better appreciation of the power relationships
between the various parties involved. Key areas that Robinson (2007) highlights that hinder
shopping malls from adequately forging a green retail culture include the diverse tenant mix which
makes cooperation difficult, varying energy needs of tenants, difficulty in ensuring responsible mall
usage by visitors, higher per capita land use than office buildings and transportation networks
especially in suburban areas. The visitor element is the most uncertain and difficult to control with
respect to forging a green retail landscape given their diverse consumption demands and
transportation modes, let alone encouraging and empowering all tenants to implement good
environmental management practices especially small tenants which lack the capacity possessed by
anchor tenants to implement any green practices effectively.

Effective physical recycling and waste management in shopping malls is a key challenge
faced by managers, where Robinson (2007) highlights that forging a robust and manageable green
framework to manage a retail landscape is more complex and difficult as opposed to commercial
and office landscapes. Mohd Rizal & Pitt (2010) presents a detailed case study on recycling and
waste management in shopping malls in the United Kingdom, where they cite the Meadowhall
Shopping Centre in Sheffield investing in a Resource Recovery Facility implementing a system to
facilitate materials sorting as well as preparing waste recovery for incineration at an energy recovery

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facility. Mohd Rizal & Pitt (2010) identified factors such as financial, organizational as well as cultural
and organizational climate are critical variables that affect the success of recycling initiatives of
shopping malls; where they argued that effective legislation are equally critical in helping building
managers in implementing effective waste management schemes. Newell’s (2009) review of CSR and
Environmental Reporting of Retail Property Developers hence called for the review and revamp of
relevant retail property indexes to forge a stronger link between sustainability and commercial
performance; as well as tax incentives to forge effective green building practices. The significant
dearth of suitable and relevant literature in sustainable retail management hence calls for the need
for more research on the environmental practices of shopping malls which this paper aims to
address, where a broad-based approach in assessing the managerial, marketing and stakeholder
interactions with respect to shaping a mall’s environmental performance is critically needed in the
study of retail geography and management.

Bridging Sustainable Retail Management with Green Building Policies and Retail Practices in
Singapore

The Singapore government has played a dominant top-down approach in encouraging the
development of Green Buildings, albeit more successful in commercial buildings as opposed to retail
and residential buildings. Challenges facing developers with respect to developing green buildings is
largely related to the incurring of high short-run construction and infrastructural costs, where CSM’s
construction costs was S$188 million which was 5% higher than that for conventional buildings
(Today, 11 Dec 2009). Though Walker (2008) highlights that developers can benefit from reduced
energy consumption and waste management costs in the long run, which the BCA estimates to be
realized within two to eight years, such perceived benefits are not immediately appreciated by
developers who typically have to incur significant loans from banks as well as government subsidies
in order to fund the building’s construction initially. The Singapore Government hence introduced
the Greenmark Scheme in 2005 to drive its construction industry towards more environmentally-
friendly buildings, promote sustainability in the built environment and raise environmental
awareness among developers, designers and builders (BCA website). The Greenmark Scheme assess
building projects in the areas of Energy and Water efficiency, environmental protection, indoor
environmental quality and other relevant features; with different ratings being Platinum, Gold Plus,
Gold and Certified awarded. The BCA has set aside S$100 million worth of cash incentives capped at
$1.5 million or up to 35% of energy efficient equipment costs. As of 1st Jan 2011, there has been
more than 600 Greenmark Projects in Singapore, of which CSM is the first shopping mall to be

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awarded the Greenmark Platinum Award in 2007. CDL was able to project that CSM can reduce
energy usage by approximately 39%, which exceeds the minimum 30% energy and water savings
required for the Platinum Award (CDL website). CSM’s energy and environmental targets were
largely developer-driven, with the architects and engineers working collectively to fulfill such targets.

The retail developer sector in Singapore has been relatively slow in forging sustainable retail
development and management to a large extent as opposed to the commercial and residential
sectors. There were only six shopping malls out of an estimated 100 building award winners in 2010
inclusive of CSM as well as 313 Somerset and Parkway Parade which are both managed by Australian
Developer Lend Lease. Though almost all major Singaporean property developers have committed
themselves to developing green buildings as part of their CSR policies, CDL remains the only
Singaporean developer to be listed on the London FTSE4Good Index series since 2002, the first
developer to receive three prestigious BCA Awards, namely the Green Mark Platinum Award for CSM,
the Green Mark Champion Award and the Built Environmental Leadership Award (Platinum) from
2007 to 2009 respectively (Tan & Chong, 2009). Tan & Chong (2009: 80-81) attributed CDL’s
aggressive environmental sustainable practices and CSR policy to three factors, namely strong top
management support, CDL’s high astuteness in identifying CSR opportunities as well as its
perseverance spirit despite all initial difficulties faced as a CSR pioneer in Singapore. As of now, CDL
still remains the sole Singaporean developer at the forefront of forging Sustainable retail
management; though Lend Lease has been similarly credited with respect to the development of 313
Somerset and the successful redevelopment of Parkway Parade which has been operational since
1984. CDL’s strong focus on forging environmental sustainability throughout its corporate practices
is largely a product of both its senior management’s vision as well as its corporate policy (Tan &
Chong, 2009), in which CSM’s development can be seen as a materialization of CDL’s environmental
policy which was first honed in 2003. CDL’s strong environmental-centric approach towards its
projects is highly reflected by CDL Managing Director Kwek Leng Joo’s remark during CSM’s official
opening that the mall was “designed and built with environmental sustainability in mind” (City News,
Apr 2010).

What makes City Square Mall Green?

CSM is a nine-storey, two basement mall that comprises mostly of retail outlets with office
spaces in the two highest levels, rendering the mall technically as a mixed-use development with a
total space of approximately 65,000 square metres. The mall would be classified as a “regional” mall,

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the highest classification possible accorded for any mall larger than 37,000 square metres
(Competition Commission of Singapore, 2008). Approximately 5% of construction costs were
invested in the development of numerous green innovations in the mall (CSM Eco Guide Booklet).
Environmentally friendly features range from energy efficient technologies to the greening of
various segments of the building premises. Innovative energy efficient technologies include LED
lighting, double-glazed façade glass facilitating natural lighting and minimization of heat penetration,
waterless urinals and motion sensors in various areas to minimize electricity consumption (see Fig.
2). CDL claims that such energy efficient technologies allows them to conserve over 11 million kWh
of electricity; an overall reduction of more than 5000 tonnes of CO2 emissions and more than 20,000
m3 of water annually (CSM website). CDL has also taken steps to enhance the liveability and
ambience of the mall’s surroundings largely through greening strategies and creative park design.
Creative greening strategies include a rooftop garden at the sixth level (see Fig. 3) , an urban park
with a green roof façade at the mall’s entrance which harness solar energy and collect rainwater (see
Fig. 4). CDL even attempts to engineer an urban ecosystem within the park such as the preservation
of an Angsana tree (see Fig. 4) throughout the construction phase as well as deliberately planting
specific flower species aimed at attracting butterflies to the park.

Fig. 2. Overview of Eco Features of CSM. Source: CSM Eco-Guide

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Fig.3 : Rooftop Garden at Level 6. Fig. 4 Green Roof with Angsana Tree at the background.
(Sources: Own)

CDL also attempts to forge environmentally sustainable practices in CSM through its tenant
mix, where major anchor tenants appear to market special eco-friendly products not necessarily
found in other outlets elsewhere. Anchor tenants in CSM include Metro Department Store, Best
Denki, Popular Bookstore, NTUC Fairprice Supermarket and Kopitiam Foodcourt. There are also two
niche eco-stores dedicated solely to selling eco-friendly products. One of the stores is Four Seasons
Organic Market & Café, situated on the third storey of CSM which sells organic food and beverages;
complemented with a café that sells organic and fair-trade coffee. Another niche store is Sunflower,
a concept store that helps independent retailers and entrepreneurs market eco-friendly handicrafts.

There are a total of 198 retail tenants and 4 office tenants in CSM, where the rest of the
tenants comprise of a standard, diverse mix in fashion, jewellery, cosmetics, health, food and
beverages, lifestyle and electronics (see Table 1). Nonetheless one very striking and alternative
aspect of CSM is the marketing of the mall as a “Kids’ Hub” (see Table 2), reflected in a deliberate
concentration of education centres in the seventh, eighth and ninth levels of CSM; as well as
aggressive child-oriented environmental educational visual messages in the entire mall, with each
level having a nature-based theme such as Sun, Water and Plants (see Fig. 5).

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Category Quantity Remarks

Department Store 1 Metro – Anchor Tenant
Fashion Apparel 24
Bags, Shoes & Accessories 13
Jewellery, Optical & Watches 11
Hair, Nail & Face Services 13
Health & Wellness 14 Amore Living (Fitness & Spa) – Major Tenant
Personal Care 6
Kids’ Ware 7
Education & Enrichment 12 Popular Bookstore – Anchor Tenant
Food Court 3 Kopitiam, Banquet, Ishi Mura Japanese Foodstreet
Western Dining and Fast Food 13
Asian Dining 14
Cafe 7
Snacks & Specialties 19
Supermarket 2 NTUC Fairprice – Anchor Tenant. Four Seasons Organic
Market is also classified as a supermarket.
Electronics & Telecommunications 7 Best Denki – Anchor Tenant
Living & Lifestyle 14
Gifts, Hobbies & Leisure 11
General Services and Offices 10
Table 1. Breakdown of Tenants in CSM. (Source: CSM Mall Guide)

Category Names of Shops

Kid’s Ware Babyware, Cerisi, Mini Princess, Mom’s Cottage,
Mommy Moo, My Little Boutique, Tom & Stefanie
Gifts, Hobbies & Leisure Comics Connection, Mini Toons, Timezone, TX-Active
Education & Enrichment CMA Mental Arithmetic Centre, Elan & Soma School,
Genius R US, iGenius, Indigo Centre, Leap
Schoolhouse, Learning Habitat, Magic Fiddler,
MindChamps Preschool, MindChamps Reading,
Popular Bookstore, The Study Place.
Table 2. Breakdown of Child-Oriented Tenants in CSM. (Source: CSM Kids’ Hub Guide)

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Fig. 5. Left: Standardized educational theme-based

motif for CSM. Top: B2 Level Theme on Water with
educational messages.

Source: Own.

Oh CDL, are you able to walk the talk?

CDL as the property manager of CSM have proactively marketed the mall’s identity as an
Eco-Mall through various events and its building management policies. CSM proactively integrates
environmentally sustainable messages and practices such as encouraging reusing of waste materials,
separation of waste, food waste recycling, waterless urinals in toilets and minimizing carbon
emissions through public transport. They do so often through its major events and programs which
aim to reach out to both tenants and visitors alike. CSM’s events however are significantly biased
towards the youths and young children, as highly reflected in the clustering of education centres in
the upper levels and kids’ shops at a designated section at Basement 2. In an email interview, CSM’s
Environmental Building Officer Kelvin Ng explained that this deliberate bias was meant to “target
middle-class families and such [enrichment] class[es] would naturally have kids”. Ng’s response
complements Tan & Chong (2009: 74)’s observation that CDL chose the youth as one of four focus
areas of its CSR policy on the grounds that they represent future key stakeholders as potential
employees, customers, shareholders etc. In addition, CSM’s regular eco-workshops and special
events such as the Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations and Okto-organised roadshows are targeted at
young children to imbue environmental sustainable practices. CSM’s ongoing one-year anniversary
celebration is themed on sweets which are largely perceived as a favourite among fellow children.,
where Fig. 6 shows a Candy-Cone workshop organized as part of the festivities. Other major youth-

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oriented events organized at CSM include the annual CDL e-Generation challenge which aims to
raise “eco-consciousness” among the youths in a fun manner (CDL website).

Fig.6 . Kids involved in the Candy Cone-

Hat Eco Workshop as part of CSM’s First
anniversary celebrations. Source: CSM
Facebook Page

However, the CSM management faces immense challenges with regards to effectively
ensuring that both tenants and visitors alike subscribe to good environmental practices which
potentially undermine the mall’s identity as an Eco-Mall to a large extent. A serious and worrying
observation is that of a relatively high turnover rate of tenants in CSM, where there are at least one
to two vacant outlets at each level. A visit to CSM’s two foodcourts namely Kopitiam and Banquet
also exhibit the same trend of two to three vacant stalls. Karen Goh, operations manager of Four
Seasons Organic Market highlighted that customer flows in CSM is relatively low due to intense
competition with the nearby Mustafa Centre in Little India and Nex Mall in Serangoon Central
(personal communication, 6 Apr 2011) especially the former which is known for its bargain-prices
which undercuts CSM’s major tenants significantly. Another key area of concern includes the limited
effectiveness of CSM’s environmental education, as reflected in varying degrees of contamination of
CSM’s multi-tier recycling bins (see Fig. 7) as well as tenants giving out plastic bags (see Fig. 8) . Ng
explains that CSM try their best to “educate and encourage tenants by engaging them personally”,
and that CSM does not offer any incentives to tenants to market eco-friendly products though they
would “take every opportunity to explain the benefits to them”. Lastly, CSM appears to be facing
resource constraints when endeavouring to minimize carbon emissions especially through their
shuttle bus services. It is ironic that the shuttle bus services provided by CSM are not hybrid buses
though the management provides priority parking lots for cars that have hybrid engines.

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Fig. 7. An example of contamination of a cans recycling bin in CSM. Source: Own.

Fig. 8. Empty NTUC Fairprice Checkout for Shoppers who bring their own bags (left) as opposed
to a customer requiring plastic bags at the right. Source: Own.

Mixed Tenant attitudes towards the “Eco-Mall” identity

The degree of tenant endorsement of CSM’s identity as an “Eco-Mall” is largely mixed to a

large extent, where it is observed that major anchor tenants play a more proactive role in supporting
CSM’s marketing approaches by selling eco-friendly products and services which may not be
available in other outlets. Claris Hong, Advertising and Promotions Executive at Metro’s Marketing
Division explained in an email interview that Metro’s decision to locate within CSM was more of a
“commercial” decision as opposed to a socially responsible one, for CSM is “ideally positioned to
serve both Singaporeans and tourists around the world”. Hong further added that Metro found a
“positive association with a mall that has positioned itself as an eco-friendly mall” and hence they
attempt to “align” themselves by carrying eco-friendly products that are not necessarily available in

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other Metro outlets. Eco-friendly products carried by Metro include Glasslock Food containers, a
gourmet water bottles, Uchino towels and Triumph undergarments. Other anchor tenants in CSM
that place special emphasis on eco-friendly products include NTUC Fairprice, Best Denki and Popular;
in which these tenants are able to attract a satisfactory customer base largely from locals from the
nearby Farrer Park Estate, though relatively smaller than other malls in the heartlands and
downtown areas. Nonetheless, Ng declined comment on whether retailers whether such perceived
reductions in energy and maintenance costs are passed down to the retailers in terms of lower rents
and public utilities costs citing confidentiality reasons.

The significant majority of small tenants do not seem to echo CSM and the anchor tenants’
marketing and management strategies with respect to marketing eco-friendly or implementing
environmental sustainable practices. The products sold in most of these tenants are no similar than
what is being marketed in traditional shopping malls. What is more ingenious is the absence of
vegetarian options in both the Kopitiam and Banquet food courts though vegetarian cuisine has
been widely publicized as an alternative, sustainable diet which serves to reduce the global
environmental impact with respect to food production. That is despite Kopitiam being certified by
the Singapore Environmental Council (SEC) as one of two “Eco-Food Courts” in January 2011, in
which the assessment criteria include providing a vegetarian food stall on top of other requirements
such as providing sustainable cutlery for takeaways and implementing a system for food waste
recycling (Straits Times, 20 Jan 2011). Nonetheless, exceptions do exist where the Goldhub jewellery
shop at Level 4 has a recycle paper box where both customers and workers can use. The Koolook
spectacle shop at Level 1 is the only one out of four spectacle shops in CSM that implement a used
contact lens return programme for its customers. Another small retailer, The Skin Pharmacy at Level
1 markets personalized skincare products incorporating biodegradable ingredients, as well as
offering rebates to customers who opt not to take an eco-friendly brown paper bag or bring their
own shampoo or shower gel bottles to fill up their skincare prescriptions (The Skin Pharmacy
website). Together with the two niche eco-outlets namely Four Seasons Organic Market and
Sunflower, these examples of small retailers actively selling environmentally-friendly products and
encouraging good practices appear to be the exception rather than the norm.

Ensuring the relevance of the public and people sector in the “Eco-Mall”

The most challenging role for CSM in sustaining its identity as an “Eco-Mall” is ensuring that
shoppers are able to contribute meaningfully through good environmental practices to a large

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extent. Robinson (2007: 289) highlights that greening retail will not work unless customers are
brought into the picture, where neither customers nor tenants will shun a shopping mall on the
grounds that it is not green. Shoppers are highly responsible for the contamination of recycling bins
which was highlighted previously, owing to lack of education with regards to proper recycling
practices. In addition, visitors patronise malls on a pragmatic note for the purpose of shopping and
not solely on socially responsible grounds such as supporting green malls and products. Goh
reflected on her experience on dealing with customers at her outlet, where she highlights that the
largely-local clientele are very “curious” about her organic food and beverage products, lamenting
that they need more education on concepts related to organic diets. Goh also highlights that the
spending power of visitors to her outlet and hence CSM as a whole are not as high as other
downtown outlets; reflecting the general skepticism by the price-sensitive public in supporting eco-
friendly stores owing to higher prices. As such, there runs a significant risk that CSM’s identity as an
“Eco-Mall” may be weakly endorsed by the public largely due to inadequate understanding of
sustainable retail and consumption vis-à-vis environmental sustainability per se; as well as their high
price sensitivity given that many eco-friendly products are alternatives to basic food provisions.

CSM also depends significantly on the public and social sector in sustaining its marketing
efforts of the mall as an “Eco-Mall”. Many governmental campaigns organized by agencies such as
the BCA, Public Utilities Board (PUB) and the National Environmental Agency (NEA) are held in CSM
such as PUB’s Water Conservation Awareness Programme held in late January 2011. CDL also
partner with NGOs such as World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and Environmental Challenge Organisation
(Singapore) to organize environmental campaigns in CSM as part of CDL’s niche focus on
environment as a key tenet of their CSR policy. CDL is a corporate partner of WWF, where CDL has
allowed WWF to execute their Earth Hour 2011 campaign by having a campaign booth at the B1
level near the main entrance leading to the Farrer Park MRT Station. Whilst such collaborations
between CDL and the public and social sector are highly useful in strengthening CSM’s image as an
“Eco-Mall” as well as improving relations for the retail development sector; it is uncertain whether
these collaborations translate into better environmental education strategies, let alone further
minimization of energy and operating costs.

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Fig. 3 WWF Earth Hour 2011 Booth at CSM B1. Source: CSM Facebook Page

Suggestions for future Research

A key suggestion for future academic research would take into consideration the significance
of the CSR rhetoric and sustainability discourse in influencing retail developer and tenant
motivations. Future research could potentially analyze trends and consumer demands for eco-
friendly goods and services to ascertain consumer responses to such services to hypothesize
whether customers are highly price sensitive and receptive to eco-friendly products which strongly
define the ability of both developer and tenant alike to perpetuate an “Eco-Mall” identity. Future
large-scale academic research might also consider consumer surveys on Eco-Malls and eco-friendly
products; or even comparative analysis between CSM and another environmentally-proactive mall
such as 313 Somerset which would bring out unexplored nuances in the sustainable retail
management and marketing discourse especially from the spatial dimension. Lastly, given that CSM
is located within the Little India district and itself on prime heritage land formerly being the New
World Amusement Park; unexplored nuances related to the contestations of heritage and cultural
conservation vis-à-vis environmental sustainability could be explored as CSM’s close proximity to its
rival Mustafa Centre may have complicated the analysis and success of CSM’s tenants and
management in successfully projecting itself as an “Eco-Mall” from the commercial dimension.

Policy Implications for Government and Developers

The case study of CSM brings out a few areas of concern in which the Singapore Government
as well as retail property developers and managers might wish to consider with regards to
strengthening and proliferating the “Eco-Mall” concept in Singapore. Given the dominant state

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influence in pushing for energy efficiency and environmental sustainability in Singapore’s built
environment, I would argue that greater collaboration between the public and private sector in
jointly crafting and refining existing frameworks is critical in the long run. In anticipation of the
imminent implementation of the Energy Conservation Act in 2013, there is an urgent need to train
qualified property managers specializing in the retail sector to help retail landscapes especially
existing malls to transit quickly to help spread CSM’s “Eco-Mall” concept to both new and existing
retail developments as efficiently as possible. The BCA Greenmark Scheme should also be refined for
retail developments to factor the additional visitor dimension in the energy, education and waste
management aspects as opposed to commercial and residential developments where the control
factors for assessments are relatively simpler. Lastly, as the existing Greenmark Scheme appears to
be a one-off program that only assesses a building’s energy efficiency prior to the construction phase;
there is a critical need for the creation of an independent assessment body to provide regular and
continuous neutral energy and environmental audits for buildings to assist developers and managers
to monitor, identify and tackle previously unknown loopholes in the system such as tenant attrition
and waste contamination in the case of CSM.

Refinements to retail property management policies in order to sustain the “Eco-Mall”

framework are needed especially in the areas of education as well as tenant and visitor relations.
Corporations such as CDL should make use of corporate coalitions such as the Singapore Green
Building Council to facilitate and collectively craft niche environmental management in the retail
arena, as well as encouraging sharing and exchange of best business and management practices in
this area. As a socially responsible property manager, CDL might wish to consider giving rental
rebates and incentives to small tenants who take proactive steps in managing their outlets in an
environmentally sustainable manner in areas such as energy and waste minimization. Another
critical area that property managers should not overlook is tenant and visitor education, where the
focus should be on effective and responsible waste and energy management rather than simply
elucidating the simple and obvious rationale for recycling and saving electricity. For example, CDL
might wish to consider NUS’s ZeroWaste campaign jointly organized by the Office of Environmental
Sustainability and Students Against Violation of the Earth where publicity campaigns emphasizing on
minimization contamination of recycling bins had some success in reducing waste contamination.

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Conclusion

The case study of CSM has shown that endorsements of the CDL-led identity as an “Eco-Mall”
reflects different environmental responses in shopping malls. The environmental hardware of a
shopping mall falls under the purview of developers and architects. In the case of CSM, the
developer, CDL has clearly shown interest in developing an environmental friendly shopping mall.
CSM has inculcated many eco-friendly technologies and policies to facilitate reduction in energy and
water consumption as well as recycling food and general waste. The environmental software of a
shopping mall depends on the environmental policies and actions of both tenants and customers,
where anchor and niche tenants have proven to be more proactive and successful in implementing
sustainable practices such as marketing of eco-friendly products and streamlining of business
practices to facilitate resource efficiency. It appears that approximately 20% of CSM’s tenants sell
environmental products or practice green retailing, of which almost all of such tenants are anchor
tenants. What is important in CSM is that several leading companies such as Metro, Best Denki,
NTUC Fairprice, Popular and Kopitiam are based as anchor tenants and it is likely that these tenants
will spearhead green produce and green consumer demand because they have the financial and
corporate muscle to do so. Smaller shopkeepers will play to consumer demands and if green
produce is not selling they will abandon such products in favor of what consumers want. In short one
can conclude that Green retailing is still in its infancy in Singapore; Singaporeans shop pragmatically
not with any discernable Green behavior pattern.

While customers have not demonstrated any Green retail interest, anchor and niche tenants
have shown to play a highly proactive role in strengthening CSM’s “Eco-Mall” image through
specialized retailing management and marketing practices. On the other hand, the relative inability
of the majority of other tenants as well as visitors to contribute meaningfully to CSM’s
environmental strategies reflects that much needs to be done from both the retailer and property
manager’s side to help empower each other in ensuring that no one is left behind with respect to
forging a sustainable green retailing culture and environment that all other malls in Singapore and
beyond can emulate in a bottom-up approach. As such, the dominant top-down nature by the
government’s energy conservation policies as well as the developer’s energy conservation and
environmental practices per se would not sufficiently forge a sustainable retailing environment if
tenants and visitors alike are unable to contribute their fair share to this otherwise fledging but
meaningful cause of sustainable ‘retail’ management. Given CSM’s close proximity to the nearby
Mustafa Centre, Singaporeans are more likely to shop pragmatically and favour the latter given its
cheap bargain prices as highly reflected in the low customer flow in CSM. The intense commercial

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competition between CSM and Mustafa Centre hence undermines significantly the former’s ability
to sustain commercially as an “Eco-Mall” despite the strong draw of anchor tenants. A second “Eco-
Mall” in an area facing less commercial competition will perhaps tell us whether sustainable retailing
in Singapore will be truly viable in the long run.

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