FAIRFIELD — No Fairfield childhood is complete since 1981 without at least a little bit of time spent wandering the Solano Town Center mall.
The mall in Fairfield has been a longtime fixture in the Solano shopping scene and in many ways shaped shopping throughout the county. Businesses and restaurants sprouted up along Gateway Boulevard over time and today the area around Fairfield’s mall is a virtual one-stop destination for home goods, clothing, shoes, athletic gear, books and just about anything else a shopper could imagine.
The mall itself has grown and evolved over the years, broadening its footprint greatly since being purchased by Starwood in 2012. The mall is now home to around 135 different shops, including anchors: Macy’s, J.C. Penney, Best Buy, Edwards Cinemas, H&M and Dick’s Sporting Goods.
Shopping is no fun without refueling with some food, and there are no worries in that department either. The mall also boasts three restaurants – Red Robin, Applebee’s and Buffalo Wild Wings – as well as a full food court that includes McDonald’s, Subway, Panda Express, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Charley’s Philly Steaks, Quickly and Pretzelmaker.
The mall continues to evolve, even as longtime anchors like Sears faded away. Solano Town Center will be adding The Habit Burger Grill as well as Dave & Buster’s.
The virus has affected every single store in Fairfield and Vacaville, the mall is no exception. The mall was initially shut down, then reopened with hours slashed to just Saturdays and Sundays with curbside pickups being offered, and was shut down again.
Many other stores have closed temporarily and some are gone for good. Store hours have changed along with ways to shop, many have gone to curbside pickups and limited the amount of shoppers inside the stores at one time. Masks are a must at this point.
Vacaville developed a large factory outlet mall. As the mall in Fairfield helped spur additional retail development in the area, Vacaville’s Premium Outlets had a similar effect.
The outlets brought a number of popular fashion brands to the region, and the crowds that pursued those brands attracted additional retailers over the years. Now, if it can’t be found in the vicinity of Nut Tree Road and Nut Tree Parkway, it probably doesn’t exist.
One of the great influences the outlets helped bring about was the feasibility of retail development across Interstate 80 at the Nut Tree complex. A one-time popular roadside stand that doubled as a pit stop on long freeway trips, the Nut Tree grew to be a center of family fun.
That popularity waned somewhat but the complex has since reinvented itself as a family fun destination as well as a retail center. Shopping at the Nut Tree includes nearly 400,000 square feet of retail space, with around 11 anchor stores and about 25 restaurants.
But retail isn’t limited to the large shopping centers. Downtown shopping districts exist in Rio Vista, Suisun City, Fairfield, Vacaville, Dixon, Benicia and Vallejo.
One aspect making these areas attractive to shoppers is the presence of specialty retailers not readily found in mall settings. These types of businesses are of particular focus in smaller markets such as Suisun City’s Waterfront District or along Benicia’s First Street.
Government officials often tout the benefits of shopping in these areas as being beneficial to local economies. The tax revenue stays local and very often the business owners live in the area, turning them into local consumers, as well.
