Consumers on shopping spree as Eid nears

City dwellers are swarming the markets and malls across Dhaka in a mad rush to complete their shopping spree ahead of the Eid-ul-Fitr – the largest festival of Muslim community. Many shoppers are hunting for good deals on apparels, footwear and beauty products.

Traders too are happily serving the customers’ needs with eye-catching products from different price ranges. Shopkeepers say they expect their sales volume to peak during the Eid season this year, as their businesses suffered greatly for nearly two years amid the Covid-19 crisis. They added that the demand for clothing items, footwear and cosmetics are high, as most shoppers did not have many purchase options in the last two years due to pandemic restrictions.

On a spot visit to the city’s Bashundhara Shopping Complex on Friday – the third weekly holiday in Ramadan, customers were found crowding the clothing, footwear and beauty product outlets.

Speaking to The Business Post, Senior Store Manager of Apex Footwear Ltd Md Shamim Sheikh said, “Our sales have gradually been increasing since the 15th Ramadan. Sales of men’s, women’s and children’s footwear rose rapidly in the first half of Ramadan.

“We hope to make good sales this year as a large number of consumers are visiting our outlets. We are optimistic this season, as our sales had declined in the last two years due to the pandemic crisis.”

The beauty product outlets – selling cosmetic items and fragrances – are also witnessing a huge turnout of customers.

Riad Hossain, manager of The Body Shop, said, “We made the biggest volume of sales so far on Friday this season. But we expect our sales to go up further in the next week, as the consumer demand for beauty products usually increases in the last quarter of Ramadan.”

Sazidur Rahman, the manager of perfume outlet Al Haramain, said, “The number of shoppers has been increasing day by day. We are expecting our sales to peak next week.”

“The shoppers are mostly buying our regular perfumes, and the most expensive fragrances are selling relatively less this year.”

He added that Al Haramain’s most popular items now are amber fragrance for women, Menare Attar Al Kaaba, and Musk Al Haramain – floral woody musk fragrance.”

As usual, people are visiting clothing outlets in the Bashundhara City Shopping Complex in droves. T-shirts, punjabis, shirts, three pieces some of the most selling items there.

Lifestyle brand Ecstasy’s Zonal Manager Monzur Rahman said, “We are witnessing good sales this year. However, our Eid season sales volume is yet to reach the pre-pandemic levels.

“We had expected more sales due to a drop in the number of people travelling to India, China and Thailand, but our sales are yet to peak. We are hoping to get a boost in our sales volume as the Eid draws near.”

Noor Hossain, who is visiting the mall with his family members, said, “Our shopping is almost complete, we came here on Friday to buy apparel for our relatives. We are trying to make everyone in my family happy, as we could not buy anything for them in the last two years.”