Several coffee shop owners are bracing up for decorating their stores and buying up more shisha (water pipes) in expectation of customers’ high turnout during World Cup.

Municipality inspectors have meanwhile warned them of their shops’ closure if they sell this banned product.

The shop owners said football matches are a major source of attraction for customers who like to smoke shisha while they watch their favorite sport and the World Cup is considered the high season to make lucrative profits.

Football matches like the UEFA championships attract a lot of spectators who visit coffee shops here to watch their favorite team playing. Coffee shops’ profits can increase by 100 percent during these seasons.

“The Spanish League contributed to our profits due to a high turnout of customers to watch Real Madrid or Barcelona’s matches. This turnout pushed us to add more seats and improve the coffee shop’s decor to accommodate visitors, said Ali Abdul Ruhman Al-Souissi, owner of a coffee shop in Jeddah.

“We know that there are a good number of customers who cannot do without shisha. However, when some inspectors tried to close down the coffee shops, they faced strong protest from the customers who have no other options to spend their leisure time in Jeddah,” Al-Souissi added.

The ban affected 238 restaurants and cafes which reported an 80 percent drop in their revenue. These cafes would make daily cash sales of 7 to 10 thousand riyals from the sales of shisha alone.

The ban in Jeddah has only recently been enforced, with Riyadh and other cities having implemented it years ago. Shisha lovers now have to drive to cafes outside the city to smoke as the decision also applies to residential areas.

Ahmed Amir, a well-known café owner in Sitteen Street, said that mayoralty employees raided the café adjacent to his and seized his water pipes. He said some cafes have since fired their employees to reduce expenses.

Amir said he himself bought the café last summer for SR 250,000 but the sudden ban on the shisha bore a heavy burden for him, adding, “Now, I only serve beverages, which don’t cover employees’ salaries, bills or rent.”

The Ministry of Interior has asked the Control and Investigation Bureau (CIB) in Makkah to start cracking down on cafes in Jeddah disregarding the legislation banning the smoking of shisha and other tobacco products in confined areas.

Sources said recently that the Jeddah Governorate sent a telegram to the CIB seeking help in enforcing the law. A CIB team is due to start its work this week by compiling the names of the cafe owners in violation of the law.

This comes after the governorate received reports about cafe owners serving shisha and tobacco in confined areas. The governorate has warned that it would also punish mayors and employees of branch municipalities for not enforcing the law.

The Interior Ministry’s ban order has been circulated to all ministries, government bodies and public establishments. The order prohibits smoking in enclosed areas, cafes, restaurants and shopping centers. The ban covers shisha and other tobacco products.