The Town Center Mall at Cobb hosted their first Valentine’s Day-themed Family Fun Day in Kennesaw on Feb. 12.
Many stores inside the mall participated in the event, offering discounts, Valentine’s Day specials and free gifts. The Social Media Rich Selfie Museum displayed a free “kissing booth” for attendees, while Aveda handed out free gift bags for the parents. Other stores like Build-A-Bear, Chick-fil-A, Lunar Golf and many more also participated in this Family Fun Valentine’s Day.
Shelly Weidner organized the event, making it free to the public. “I’ve been planning mall events for over 20 years, and with my staff we all work as a team to get things accomplished,” Weidner said.
During this Valentine’s Day event, the Town Center Mall also debuted a new store, Space Battle Airsoft Shooting Range. They offered special and discounted prices, where participants received several rounds of airsoft ammo to experience the indoor battlefield. The head-turning new store is located in between Bath & Body Works and Journeys.
“We typically hold kid’s events every month or two and have for years,” Weidner said. “Some of our events are annual traditions like Hop into Spring, Back to School Bash, Santa’s Arrival and PJ Party with Santa, but we plan others with different themes in between those as well. We do events to entertain our community of shoppers, as well as draw people to the mall and into our stores.”
Gatherings were restricted since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, so Weidner has not been able to plan a February event since 2019. Because of this, expectations were low in regard to turnout.
“The turnout was better than expected! We had over 500 people attend—close to 120 families,” Weidner said. All attendees were given a little taste of Valentine’s Day, as they were finally able to go out more due to fewer restrictions on public gatherings.
“Over the past year, we’ve seen some of our largest event attendances that we have ever had,” Weidner said.
With the help of the Town Center Mall’s Valentine’s Day event, the coordinator and her staff offered hope that there is a chance of things heading back to normal nearly two years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The next event at the Town Center Mall will be the Frozen 5K and Snowflake 1K on Feb. 19.
