I suppose I was too young to really remember it clearly but I recall accompanying my father to the airport on business trips and I don't recall anything being for sale aside from some donuts and coffee. Commercialism has taken over the world, that is for sure. I think that for the major airports there is no flight reason why they need to be as large as they are, but they build all this retail space first and then putting actual gates is just an afterthought. They force us to walk though all of these areas because if the mall was off to the side I don't think very many people would go to it at all.