With most of the schools scheduled to reopen after two weeks from now, supermarkets and stationers have come out with promotions, offering attractive deals for buyers of all items that children need.
With hopes that a late September rush will strengthen their back-to-school shopping season, a number of promotions are being refreshed by retailers for those expected to join the schools after Eid al-Fitr.
“We started a back-to-friends promotion for schoolchildren two weeks ago. But starting Wednesday (today), we will begin another back-to-school festival with new prices and new stock,” the duty officer at the Carrefour in City Center said yesterday.
Because of the calendar push this year due to Ramadan, the opening of most of the schools this year in Qatar is taking place on dates different from the usual first week of September.
“This second promotion related to school opening is expected to last for another 10 days,” he added.
To lure the buyers, most major retailers in Qatar have set up giant kiosks or marked areas welcoming them to the colourful world of school shopping.
On offer this year are hard-shell turtle trolleys (starting from QR45), trolley bags (starting QR66), colouring sets including coloured chalks, crayons and pencils (starting QR13), and children and teenage clothing.
Most of the stores are also carrying all-in-all back-to-school box sets that include as many as 36-in-1 essential pieces for QR99: water flask, lunch box, an 18” trolley backpack, lunch bag, pencil case, stationery – all in one box.
The Giant Stores is offering customers a gift voucher of QR100 for every purchase of QR250 from its stationery section.
At Dasman, one of the top 10 hypermarkets in the country as categorised by the Ministry of Business and Trade, a back-to-school promotion was launched on September 1, but another promo will begin tomorrow (September 17), according to an official.
“This second series of promotion will have prices of school essentials slashed even further,” the official said.
Back-to-school has historically been one of the most lucrative times of the year for retailers.
“Customer traffic can’t be judged as flat. We are treating this year as the same as the last year. We understand more residents will be coming back after Eid,” Mohamed Altaf , regional director of Emke Group that runs the LuLu chain of hypermarkets, said.LuLu started its back-to-school promotion on September 1 as well but plans to keep it running until at least the first week of October.
“We have noted that shopping continues, sometimes even after children are already back in the classroom. We expect the pent-up demand then to spur sales further,” he added.
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