RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Re­tail­ers at Gulf City Mall were forced to im­ple­ment crowd-con­trol mea­sures yes­ter­day as bar­gain hunters surged as they sought to cap­i­talise on Box­ing Day sales.

Out­side the She Rocks store at Gulf City Mall, hun­dreds con­verged, cre­at­ing a rush so in­tense that man­age­ment was forced to tem­porar­i­ly close the en­trance and lim­it ac­cess to just 50 cus­tomers at a time. “There is enough for every­one, but we will have to close back the bar­ri­er if you con­tin­ue to push,” an ex­as­per­at­ed work­er shout­ed. Ad­di­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty guards were hired as the crowd pressed for­ward, dri­ven by the promise of mas­sive deals on high-qual­i­ty dress­es, jeans and jumpers.

Store su­per­vi­sor Kirstin Ram­roop said so­cial me­dia played a ma­jor role in fu­el­ing an­tic­i­pa­tion for the sale. “Once the posts went up, peo­ple start­ed com­ing out in large num­bers,” Ram­roop said. He not­ed that high-qual­i­ty dress­es were be­ing sold for $200, while jumpers were priced at $150.

Next door at elec­tron­ics re­tail­er Riztech, the shop­ping fren­zy con­tin­ued as long lines stretched along the store­front. Shop­pers wait­ed pa­tient­ly for a chance to pur­chase 43-inch tele­vi­sions priced at $1,500.

Among them were Adri­an Wor­rell and his broth­er-in-law Andy Ha­jari, who pur­chased three tele­vi­sions. “This is a sale we wait for every year,” they said, de­scrib­ing the prices as too good to pass up.

By mid­day, park­ing be­came a prob­lem, so cus­tomers parked on the side streets and in front of the mall.

Mean­while, in Princes Town, shop­ping picked up un­der the watch­ful eyes of po­lice, mak­ing it no­tice­ably busier than San Fer­nan­do. At JD’s Ex­clu­sive in Princes Town, the store was filled to ca­pac­i­ty, with long lines stretch­ing the length of the out­let.

Own­er Dave Ho­sein said his loy­al cus­tomers come out every year to cap­i­talise on the 33 per cent off sale. How­ev­er, he said is­sues with for­eign ex­change and the clear­ing of goods at Cus­toms need­ed im­prove­ment to make busi­ness prof­itable. Ho­sein said they were try­ing to keep prices low de­spite these con­straints.

Street ven­dor Ronald King said the sea­son had been par­tic­u­lar­ly dif­fi­cult for him. “This has been by far the worst sea­son for sales,” King said, though he re­mained hope­ful that more shop­pers would turn out as prices con­tin­ue to drop.

“Peo­ple come to Princes Town be­cause we have the best prices. We are hop­ing more peo­ple will come out over the week­end,” he added.

In stark con­trast to both Gulf City and Princes Town, shop­ping in San Fer­nan­do was slow­er than usu­al.

Pres­i­dent of the Greater San Fer­nan­do Cham­ber of Busi­ness and Com­merce, Ki­ran Singh, blamed this on a rise in on­line shop­ping and oth­er re­tail op­tions.

“We have a lot of com­pe­ti­tion from on­line shop­ping and the malls that sur­round San Fer­nan­do and oth­er ur­ban ar­eas, and that could con­tribute to the low­er traf­fic flow in down­town to­day,” Singh said. He added, how­ev­er, that there was still time for busi­ness­es to re­cov­er. “We still have a few days be­fore the start of the new year. Sales will con­tin­ue through­out.”

Singh not­ed that many busi­ness­es were ex­tend­ing their sales and op­er­at­ing hours in re­sponse to slow­er-than-ex­pect­ed pre-Christ­mas ac­tiv­i­ty. “Down­town San Fer­nan­do is fa­mous for of­fer­ing ex­tend­ed hours and deep dis­counts. We have to com­pete,” he said. “On­line shop­ping con­tin­ues to in­crease in mag­ni­tude, and the mega malls out­side of down­town San Fer­nan­do con­tin­ue to im­pact us.”

He al­so point­ed out that some San Fer­nan­do busi­ness­es have adapt­ed by of­fer­ing a hy­brid shop­ping ex­pe­ri­ence. “We have a cou­ple of stores that of­fer vir­tu­al op­tions where you can or­der on­line and pick up in-store or have items de­liv­ered,” Singh said. “That start­ed dur­ing the COVID pe­ri­od, and it con­tin­ues.”

How­ev­er, Singh said down­town shop­ping still of­fers some­thing on­line plat­forms can­not. “A lot of peo­ple want to feel the item, hold it and try it on,” he said. “That’s the chal­lenge with on­line shop­ping — the risk of the item not be­ing ap­pro­pri­ate.”

He said as Box­ing Day sales con­tin­ue through the week­end and in­to the fi­nal days of the year, re­tail­ers across South Trinidad were hop­ing the ex­tend­ed dis­counts would draw more shop­pers back in­to tra­di­tion­al shop­ping dis­tricts, even as malls and on­line plat­forms con­tin­ue to get bet­ter sales.