Capital Mall's level of family-friendliness has been called into question by some customers recently, but mall management say no merchandise on display is inappropriate.
Jefferson City resident Steve Meystrik noted dissatisfaction with his perception of the mall's atmosphere in a letter to the editor published on the News Tribune Opinion page on Dec. 7.
"Although there are several fine stores at the Capital Mall, I try to limit my purchases there to a minimum. I do this because I no longer believe the Capital Mall provides a family-friendly environment to shop with my wife and our four young daughters," Meystrik said. "I came to this conclusion when the Capital Mall began allowing kiosks to openly display merchandise near their Center Court that is in my opinion of poor taste."
Meystrik's concerns focus mainly on a T-shirt kiosk near the Jefferson City mall's main entrance that displays T-shirts sporting sexually suggestive messages - from the tamest, like a purple shirt with the phrase "Sexy and I know it," to the racier, like a black T-shirt with a grinning face saying "Boobies make me happy" and a green one with a drawing of a woman's bare breasts that reads "Please tell your boobs to stop staring at my eyes."
The kiosk started doing business at Capital Mall in November 2013, but is under different management now. This is not the first time customers have taken offense to its merchandise.
"There were some that had flat-out vulgar language printed on them. There was some pretty blatant sexual content that was definitely inappropriate," said Jamie Reed, Capital Mall general manager. "Through feedback from our customers, which is much appreciated, we were able to remove everything that we thought was inappropriate."
Mall management monitors the kiosk's merchandise weekly, Reed said, and has deemed everything currently for sale there appropriate for display.
"Some of the stuff that's out there now could possibly be deemed suggestive depending on who's looking at it. But by no means do we feel it's inappropriate," Reed said. "If you look directly to your left to the Victoria's Secret window, you're going to see things that are way more suggestive than that T-shirt; and I haven't heard any complaints about the windows."
To critics like Meystrik, though, some of the kiosk's merchandise still crosses a line; and with its positioning near the front entrance, families have little choice in whether they walk past it on the way to the stores they'd choose to enter.
"T-shirts are openly displayed that promote illegal drug use and contain sexual innuendo," Meystrik said in his letter. The drug use he refers to is recreational marijuana, legal in some states but not in Missouri, and a subject of several shirts at the kiosk. Various shirts encourage viewers to "Just Doob It," "Keep One Rolled" and be "Rolling Stoned."
"It's a fair question," Reed said of the marijuana-related shirts. "Those shirts specifically have not been complained about to me; the complaints I was getting were about the sexual shirts and the vulgar language. I can see kids who might not know what that is asking about it, and parents might not want to have to tell them."
He encourages all customers with concerns to contact the management office: "It absolutely helps to get the feedback from the customers if they see something that they feel is inappropriate. We might not take down every single thing that somebody is offended by, but at least we can take it into consideration."
Meystrik said he has done so, but not all of his concerns have been addressed to his satisfaction: "I have simply asked that the inappropriate T-shirts be made less visible to people walking past the kiosks. Although the general manager of the Capital Mall has stated his desire to provide a family atmosphere, he has taken the position such T-shirts are commonplace in shopping centers all over the country."
Reed maintains that the mall, overall, cultivates a family-friendly shopping environment, noting its continued hosting of charity events like the free train rides and Santa visits for Special Learning Center children last week.
"This is a family community. We feel like we're a big part of the community, and we want to continue to be," he said. "We've been doing a tremendous amount of work to rebuild the reputation of the mall," Reed said.
He also feels the mall management must balance that aspect with consumer demand.
"We are maintaining a retail shopping center here. That's what our customers are coming for," Reed said. "At the same time we're a family-friendly shopping center, we also want to provide an environment that is profitable for our merchants. It's a fine line, but those guys wouldn't have those shirts displayed if our customers weren't buying them."