Store Closings. Doom and gloom or the next wave of possibilities?

While stores closing and downsizing is a painful short term reality there lies opportunity.  Kenneth Cole will close nearly all of its stores, 63 in total to focus on his online business.  It looks like he will keep flagship stores in NYC and Arlington, Virginia.  As hard as it might seem for those of us in the retail world, it makes sense. The reality is, Kenneth Cole will still have a need to connect with his fans in the real world, just not through an expensive fixed retail store format.  He will also still have a need to sell his product in the real world, just not at his outlet store format anymore.  So we can bemoan another round of store closings or we can get cracking on what is next for these brands.  How can we repurpose physical retail space to be more nimble and temporary? What are other real world formats that will put him in touch with his fans without the long term investment of a store?  How are we making it easy for brands to pop-up across the nation without signing a 10 year store lease?  As retail designers and developers are we dreaming big enough and are we moving fast enough?