Franklin Mills - Branding and Design

Branding and Design

Franklin Mills mall is designed in the shape of a thunderbolt in commemoration of Franklin's kite-and-key experiment. The mall's logo includes a red kite with a lighting bolt on the right side and the string ending on the letter "A" of "FRANKLIN". The mall is separated by its four Neighborhoods: Red, Blue, Yellow, and Green, and has six main entries including its neighborhood color entries, plus Aqua at the Grand Court and the Orange entry in its Green Neighborhood near the former Steve & Barry's. There are also entries at either side of the AMC 14 theater for moviegoers after mall hours.

The mall is the first Mills mall to have two food courts. "Cafe Court" is at Red Neighborhood 1 and is anchored by GAP. "Cafe Freedom" is a larger food court at Green Neighborhood 4. Like all Mills Landmarks, the mall has graphics, usually hanging from the ceiling. A sculpture of Benjamin Franklin's Face is located at the Grand Court between Neighborhoods Blue & Yellow. Almost all main mall entries have a graphic at its entry. Throughout the mall, there are several sets of projection TVs hanging from the ceiling known as "Mills TV", showing video loops of music videos and advertisements.

The 1,600,000-square-foot (150,000 m2) mall consists primarily of factory outlet stores. As of November 2011, the surviving major anchor tenants include Marshalls, and Burlington Coat Factory. When the mall first opened in 1989 the original anchors were J. C. Penney; Sears; Ports of the World, a discount apparel, housewares and giftware chain of Boscov's Department Stores, Reading, Pa.; Reading China and Glass, a housewares chain also based in Reading; and Phar-Mor, Youngstown, Ohio, a deep discount drug chain. Over time the Ports, was re-branded as Boscov's, and later replaced by Steve & Barry's, before the location became vacant, Reading China & Glass closed and its building was split between Marshalls and Office Max, Sears leaves the mall for the first time and was replaced by General Cinema, itself acquired by AMC Theatres. Office Max later leaves the mall, and Sears returns, taking the Office Max space. Original stores remaining in the mall include Bed, Bath and Beyond & Modell's, which have been joined by Forever 21, Last Call, H&M, & Off 5th, among others. As of November 29, 2011, 3 of the mall's 5 anchors are vacant. On December 15, 2011, it was announced that J.C. Penney would be returning to the mall as a department store, in its original location, the outlet store had been closed as part of a nationwide realignment by the retailer of all its outlet stores.