JEDDAH, 16 July 2003 — The Jeddah Summer Festival, which is supposed to attract tourists to the city’s various shopping areas, has so far met with little success. Despite sales promotions in most stores and entertainment activities in some of the shopping malls, there are fewer shoppers than during previous years.
“So far business has been slow, and we haven’t seen as many shoppers as before,” said Khalid Abdullatif, Laura Ashley store manager in Heraa Mall.
The stores on Heraa Street including Heraa Mall were also hurt by maintenance works on the street during the past few months.
“The mall is a regular stop for people going to or coming from the Corniche, but with all the detours and traffic congestion during maintenance, people find it difficult to reach the mall, but hopefully now that the maintenance is finished we can pick up pace again,” Abdullatif told Arab News.
Competition from new shopping malls opening nearby is another factor in the decreased number of shoppers.
“About 70 percent of our customers this summer are Jeddah locals and not tourists,” Abdullatif said.
“It’s still early to say whether the summer shopping festival is a success, but it doesn’t look promising,” said Samir, the manager of a kitchen and household accessories store. “By this time we usually see many Saudis from other regions visiting the mall, but now there aren’t that many and most of them just walk around and don’t shop,” said Samir.
On the other hand, Samih Ibrahim, the manager of another store, thinks that the summer sale promotion and the mall’s entertainment activities are attracting customers.
Tahlia Street is a high-end shopping destination with designer label stores. “Customers in Tahlia Street are usually of a certain level and they are familiar with the brand names of the stores,” said Maher Ayub, assistant sales manager of Debenhams.
New malls are also opening on Tahlia, but they don’t pose a threat to the established stores, according to Ayub, because each store is unique, and the more variety of stores open, the more customers there will be.
Even though most of the stores on Tahlia have sales, they are not purposely scheduled to coincide with the festival. “The Tahlia stores don’t rely on the Jeddah Festival to increase their business because in the summer most of our customers, whether Saudis or expatriates, are away,” Ayub said. “I think the timing of the festival is wrong. With the unbearable heat and humidity it’s difficult to convince people to step out even in the evening. Look at the Dubai shopping festival, it’s scheduled at a time when the weather is nice, and besides it is very organized and offers more events and activities,” he said.
Another problem in Tahlia is traffic flow. “There aren’t that many parking areas and the traffic is not managed well at peak time, which prevents people from enjoying themselves,” he said.
Nevertheless, even though the festival was not sufficiently publicized in advance, Ayub thinks there are some attractions for Saudis from other regions. “Jeddah is freer, and there are places and activities to enjoy not found in the other regions.”
