Surprise in store for those shoppers who lose their valuables

RIYADH, 8 March — Gold jewelry, hundreds of watches, wallets with cash and credit cards, hand bags, goggles, prams and what have you. They adorn what looks like a fancy showroom at one of Riyadh’s major hypermarkets.

“These items have been in our possession for over two years now. The rightful owners should contact us and claim their property,” Adel S. Al-Habib, acting managing director of Arabian Marketing Co. Ltd. (Euromarche), and Edward Bermingham, buying-operation director, told Arab News.

The range and quality of these nearly 400 lost and found items, with a cumulative resale value of around SR200,000, provide a clue. They were left over by the upwardly mobile women with a penchant for shopping at several upscale facilities on a single day.

“ We receive five to six million visitors a year of whom two million are actual buyers. This boils down to 3000-4000 buyers a day on weekdays and 6,000 at weekends,” Adel Habib observes. The ebb and flow of the shoppers’ tide naturally leaves some rich pickings on the shore, or shopping floor in this case.

Some of the shoppers come back to reclaim their belongings. Others are contacted, if they leave their calling cards in the wallet. The problem arises with a host of other items, such as watches, jewelry and even prams — ten of them still waiting for their users. Where the owners fail to show up even after a prolonged wait, the management is left with no choice but to sell them off. A sum of SR10,000 realized this way has been donated to charity.

According to Bermingham, the increase in the number of forgotten items generally coincides with Euromarche’s anniversary promos — in April — when up to 20,000 shoppers would be crowding in. This contrasts with their regular promotional campaigns that draw 7,000-8,000 customers at a time.

The high point of this campaign was for a cola drink a few years ago when a record 30,000 cans were sold one day. As many as 40 trucks roamed the capital for two hours delivering the cans.

What was the impact on sales after Sept. 11? “Of course, there was a five to six percent drop in sales. But we still did better than others whose sales were down by 30 percent,” Bermingham points out. Customer loyalty cards, gift schemes, “Spend and Save” program as well as other incentives have helped them cushion the impact of the aftermath. “Moreover, ours is the first and only hypermarket in the Middle East to be ISO 9002-certified,” he adds.

As for Euromarche’s future plans, Adel Habib announced that they would be embarking on an expansion program. “We are negotiating the purchase of a 47,000 sq.m. site in the north of Riyadh. We hope to conclude the deal sometime this year.” Expansion is the name of the game if a business establishment wishes to retain the competitive edge. And Euromarche has signified its determination with this latest move. “The only way to survive is to expand,” he adds.