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Press, 19 November 1981, Page 15

The manager of the Merivale Mall shopping complex, Mr Alister Price (above), has returned to Christchurch after a four-week United States trip to study shopping malls, marketing techniques, and to attend the Marketing Conference of the International Council of Shopping Centres in Miami. As well as bar coding of supermarket goods, Mr Price said that he could visualise the introduction of cable television in New Zealand soon. This was already being used by some American housewives to find out the prices of various items at their local supermarket. Mr Price was accompanied by three of the shop proprietors of Merivale Mall on his trip, which covered Los Angeles,. Miami, New York, Chicago, Las Vegas, and Honolulu. “Shopping centres in the United States seem to do everything so • much better,” he said. “All shop lighting is concealed. The landscaping is most attractive and, strange as it may seem, there are no supermarkets in any of the shopping malls. All the supermarkets are down the road a bit, mainly because'they could not hope to afford the enormous rates and rentals inside the shopping centres.” . . f ' ' Shopping centres in the United States were open for longer. •’ ’• Most were open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday to Saturday, and from noon to 6 p.m. on Sundays. But, there were moves to have the Sunday hours lengthened, and for Monday to be a holidav