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Update

By Jon Springer

In what it called its “clicks-and-mortar strategy,” General Growth Properties has launched a Website designed to drive traffic to its 125 malls while providing a platform for sponsorships, promotions and advertising sales.

Mallibu.com, which was expected as of press time to be fully enabled by mid-October, will provide links to all of General Growth’s malls. The site will offer Web users coupons, an e-mail newsletter and other retailer-driven promotions to drive customers to their local mall. GGP in turn hopes to gather customer information to develop more effective marketing campaigns and target shoppers’ needs.

General Growth called the site the first “true digital and physical shopping experience for customers who enjoy both traditional retail shopping and online information-gathering.” Customers who shop online for a specific brand or product, for instance, might come across a promotion on Mallibu that would direct them to buy at a General Growth mall.

“It would be the retailer’s own Web initiatives that would determine the impact on mall sales,” said John Bucksbaum, CEO of the Chicago-based developer. “We’re working to facilitate what they’re trying to do.”

The site complements the efforts of Coolsavings.com, an Internet coupon site which forged an exclusive deal with General Growth earlier this year.

General Growth is among several retail property owners planning to capture new business on the Internet this fall. Konover Property Trust said in August it would launch an outlet shopping site, . Simon Property Group is preparing to launch a Web project later this year in the Atlanta market.

Bucksbaum said the cost of Mallibu “is not even remotely close,” to the $15 million figure that Simon CEO David Simon said his company’s project would cost. “At this point what we mostly have invested is human capital,” said Bucksbaum, who declined to give an actual figure.

GGP’s site will employ an online strategy that complements and facilitates the efforts of its retailers, said Peter Pike, president of Pikenet Communications, a Ross, Calif.-based firm specializing in real estate services and the Internet.

“The theory is great: Owners of physical real estate should use the Web to drive traffic to their tenants’ physical stores,” Pike said. “In fact, local merchants have some intriguing advantages over purely cyber-based enterprises, including faster delivery and direct personal service. That’s the whole theory behind a ‘clicks-and-mortar’ strategy, which every major retailer will develop. So landlords have a vested interest in seeing this strategy succeed. Bravo for GGP.”

Mallibu.com launched with a sweepstakes promotion offering users concert tickets and shopping sprees. Web users can register at the site, www.mallibu.com., or by visiting a General Growth mall. General Growth corporate information will continue to be posted on the company Website at .