On the second floor of the BIG Fashion Glilot strip mall, an “opening soon” sign is currently posted. Although the occupancy has been full since the opening days last February, with all 160 stores and restaurants in the shopping center fully occupied, there is already a churn rate. Opening soon is a second Israeli store of the SKIMS brand, imported to Israel by Irani Group, (owners of Factory 54, which have a massive presence in BIG Glilot) – and already operates a SKIMS at rival Ramat Aviv Mall, four kilometers to the south.
The giant strip mall, spread over 44,000 square meters and built with an investment of about NIS 2 billion, is marking a year since its opening. If in the first days of trading, pictures were seen of huge lines of cars at the exit from the parking lot, today it is already clear that the strip mall has become a place on Israel’s retail landscape that is difficult to ignore.
The winter problem
According to RIS data, in its first months, BIG Glilot had sales of about NIS 90 per square meter (about NIS 4 million per day) – well above the average for strip malls in Israel and also higher than the nearby Seven Stars Mall in Herzliya. In the summer months, it reported sales slightly below average, while in December and January, the colder and slower months in terms of mall traffic, the figure was just under NIS 60 per square meter. Although this is a relatively weak figure, it is stable compared with its rivals and the national average.
“BIG’s advantage in trying to create a kind of sterile urban experience in the form of a street mall, becomes problematic in the winter months,” explains a senior official in the mall industry. According to others in the market, this is a negligible phenomenon. “Yes, the mall is close to the sea, and there are no buildings in the way to balance and block the winds,” says an industry executive, “but there is less than a month of winter in Israel every year. When you weigh everything up, the wind is not what is stopping the mall from growing.”
BIG Glilot has several main competitors: Ramat Aviv Mall and Seven Stars Mall, which are relatively close to it, and Azrieli Group’s Ayalon Mall in Ramat Gan. “There is no doubt that it has created an earthquake in our field,” says one source. “It gives us a fight, and that is good. It also pushes us to do new things, renew the tenant mix and offer new attractions.”
“You can see in the RIS data that there is a 15%-18% drop in the revenue of fashion chains in the malls surrounding BIG,” explains another senior official in the mall industry. “We also need to take into account the other malls in the Sharon region, such as Rananim (Ra’anana), G Kfar Saba and others, whose traffic dropped significantly in the first months after the launch.”
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To illustrate the impact, we can look at the sales of the Ramat Aviv Mall. If in April 2025 it was NIS160 shekels per square meter, two months later it had dropped to about NIS 130 per square meter. Since then, the mall has not managed to return to the sales level it enjoyed in the past, although it is still more than twice that of BIG Glilot.
And what’s happening in Herzliya? “Our main goal is to deepen the distinction of the Seven Star Mall as the new ‘city square,’ the place where you come for a complete family experience,” says Yaniv Feinschneider, CEO of the HaKashra’eh Yishuv Malls, which owns the mall. “We are working to establish new anchors, both in the field of commerce and in the field of services, and one of the main steps in our preparations is to open the mall with dining areas facing Herzliya Park.”
“No risk for chains”
Another problem that came up in our conversations with industry figures is the rental model in BIG Glilot. “It’s not really income producing real estate,” explains a senior official. “If you ask tenants to invest NIS 14,000 per square meter, you significantly reduce your rental income,” he claims, “and I know several tenants at BIG Glilot who were offered this.
“Even in catering – entire restaurants were set up without a single penny from the tenant. It seems crazy to me that there is almost no risk to the chains. They can get a ready-made store from BIG, without any investment on their part and then move away and demand high exit fees. When the tenant has no risk, the game changes.”
“There has been no mall that has opened on this scale,” explains a competitor in the mall industry. “There was a lot of talk about the location of BIG Glilot, whether a complex like it could work in terms of size and brand mix.
“BIG has managed to bring something different to the experience and connect Ramat Aviv and the Seven Stars with high-end cuisine and fashion. Besides, this is a location that is a destination by definition. It does not belong to a city, and it is not between neighborhoods, so all of its opening data was questionable. BIG was a peripheral brand that dealt with peripheral brands, and here it made a leap forward. It had to break into the market with a high-risk rental model to do that.”
Unlike its competitors, BIG is open on Shabbat, which led to a petition on the matter and to the fact that the Ramat Hasharon municipality ordered inspectors to fine businesses approximately NIS 500 for violating workers’ rights. In addition, a letter from rabbis was distributed calling on the ultra-Orthodox public not to shop at the complex because of this. BIG CEO Hai Galis, of course, opposed the decision, and after a certain time the fines were stopped. The petition is currently going through the courts.
Looking to Petah Tikva
“BIG Glilot’s challenges right now are a kind of manic-depressive traffic,” explains Moty Azoulay, a marketing expert and former executive at the global Mango chain. “The mall suffers from crazy ‘peaks’ on weekends and quiet on midweek mornings. Once the high-tech tower above it is fully occupied, it will have a lot of captive customers.”
According to an industry executive, about 40% of BIG Glilot’s revenue comes at weekends, including Saturdays. “This is not the healthiest thing for a mall at the beginning, but it may be part of its uniqueness,” he says.
But various sources also point to the change and the success in the first year. “In the initial presentations, BIG talked about revenue of NIS 800-900 million per year, but they are already close to NIS 1.5 billion, and that is not a given.” According to them, the waiting list for restaurants and stores still exists, and continues to grow.
Ultimately, a year is considered a relatively short time for a shopping center of the type of BIG Glilot, and a longer time frame is required to examine it. Perhaps that is why the slogan chosen for the digital campaign that came out at the end of the week (through Gitam BBDO and with an investment of about NIS 3 million) is “A year has passed, and we have only just begun.”
An additional competitive arena is expected for BIG Shopping Centers (TASE: BIG) in Petah Tikva, which is being built with an investment of about NIS 2.2 billion. There, the main rivals will be the Melisron Group with the large Ofer Mall and the other players in the commercial and employment areas in the area. This is 63 dunams (15.75 acres) with about 250,000 square meters of offices (three 40-floor towers), of which 10,000 square meters will also be allocated for hotels and 150,000 square meters for parking lots. What the competition will do to area, will only be known at the end of 2028, the date when the opening is planned.
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on February 23, 2026.
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2026.
