“What happened to Cineleisure Orchard?”, asks a recent Reddit user on the Singapore subreddit.
It’s not the first time this question has been asked over the years. From a bustling hangout spot for teens and young adults in the 2000s, it now appears near-deserted even during weekends.
Numerous tenants have moved out over the years, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, as malls reeled from the lack of footfall.
With only a handful of shops open, some have even wondered if Cineleisure Orchard might be sold.
However, this does not appear to be the case, as new tenants are allegedly moving into the mall, and renovations are ongoing.
Sources who requested to be anonymous told MS News that new tenants have moved into the mall and renovation works are underway, hence the sheer number of storefronts obscured by boards.
As this process happened towards the end of last year, the mall is currently transitioning.
The food court at Basement 1 and Collins’ appear to be undergoing rejuvenation, although there’s no indication of what will replace them. Only Maki-San remains open in Basement 1 currently.
Because many tenants, such as Quick Greens, Menbaka Fire Ramen, and MOS Burger, have moved out in recent months, food options at the mall currently appear limited. Only Fatburger, KFC, and The Assembly Ground, along with GudSht, remain open, though they are mainly empty during non-peak hours.
However, the shops that remain appear to be doing better than appearances may indicate.
One tenant at Level 2 who declined to be named said the shop is “doing very well” – even though footfall is seemingly low across the board.
We also saw certain stores advertising for both part-time and full-time staff, which isn’t what a store would be doing if they were imminently moving out or closing shop.
Similarly, a fair number of people were at Cineleisure to attend fitness classes at Level 3.
While the number of film audience members does not appear as robust as before, this can perhaps be applied across the board for most cinemas across Singapore as patrons turn to streaming services, such as Netflix and Disney+, for their movie fix.
MS News has reached out to Cineleisure Orchard for comment.
Even though Cineleisure is a historic, even nostalgic, hangout spot for many Singaporeans, it’s not hard to see why the number of patrons has fallen.
Higher spending power is undoubtedly a factor. Student Anna Fu, 20, told MS News that while she visited Cineleisure a lot in secondary school for their relatively cheap phone cases in the town area, she moved on to other malls after receiving more allowance.
Other older respondents agreed. Civil servant Ben, 32, said the lure of hanging out at Cineleisure had largely ceased by the time they moved on to tertiary education.
With many other haunts in the area, like ION Orchard, Plaza Singapura, 313@Somerset, and Orchard Central, Cineleisure appears to have fallen off the list of go-to places for the young.
Neighbouring *SCAPE also faces a similar situation. However, it is also undergoing revamp.
Though Cineleisure can’t be said to be at the forefront of trends anymore, there was still a steady stream of people visiting WeTuft – a tufting studio that’s a nice unconventional date spot – and Bounce Park, especially on weekends.
Rumours of Cineleisure’s demise may thus be greatly exaggerated.
Does Cineleisure need to get more tenants to revitalise the spot for Singaporeans, especially the young? That might perhaps be one of the solutions since it would likely mean more reasons for shoppers to head down to the mall.
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Featured image by MS News.
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