Category: South african retailers

I was delighted to receive an invitation from a very good friend of mine  to have lunch at Clos Malverne wine estate. The generous invitation included partners and was also for a Friday, my favorite day of the week to relax in the beauty of the cape. Clos Malverne is situated on Devon Valley road, Stellenbosch, about 45 minutes drive from Capetown close to JC Le Roux and Hartenberg wine estates. The restaurant offers a la carte or you can select the food and wine pearing experience. We were definately…

Across the board generally in most retail stores in South Africa you as a customer will receive mediocre service at best. My statement is related to the big local national retailers in our malls. The main reason for this is a result of these businesses containing costs, and staff are a major expense. Two choices face the national retailer, … Believe in offering top level customer service which will require recruiting experienced sales associates. Pay them well and offer commission on achieving sales targets. Be prepared to provide formal training…

For Edgars the sharks are circulating! Poor executive management decisions and too many CEO changes have contributed to the retailers demise. Although still the biggest player in the SA market with 7% to 8% of retail space, Edgars is slowly losing market share at 6% over the last four years. New CEO Bernie Brooke’s, another non South African, has stated he will turn the business around in two years. His predecessor bailed after four years of a five year contract, leaving behind many of the consequences of his blunders which…

On another visit to H&M waterfront this week, I had an objective to try and form a view on the price points. Were they still similar to when the store opened or had any price increases crept in. I based most of my opinion from the men’s and homeware departments as that is where I did my initial buys in October 2015. To be honest I could still find the basic T shirt at R79, R99 and R129. Abundance of styles and colors in every size. I did get a…

Common practice in most fashion retailers across the word is to have one or two rails positioned at the rear of a department to merchandise the end of range garments. If a style has a good clearance reaction and sells through with only one or two units left, these will be removed from the main merchandise area and housed on a rail along with other end of range product. Customers understand this concept and will go to the rail to establish what the good sellers have been for the season…

I have written two previous articles on the subject of Edgars and how they treat the customer base who is still shopping in thier stores. Unfortunately both pretty negative. I like to test every now and again to see if I can find  any indication of a change. This week I wanted to buy a pair of shoes and decided to check out Edgars in Tygervalley. On arrival at the men’s shoe department I browsed through the various racks of footwear, mostly merchandised by brand. I was drawn to the display counter…

We may all be ignoring the fact that prices of products are becoming more expensive as we all still want to continue to live our current lifestyle and buy those latest sexy high heels. Reality is, that pair of shoes already has a more expensive price tag than this time last year and will be even more expensive in six months time. We have many International brands trading in our South African malls these days, and that is a good thing as we all want choice and to be in the…

When mall shopping started to become a four hour session, coffee breaks started to become an urgent requirement to allow the shoppers some time out. They can sit for a while and refresh with a filter coffee before hitting the remaining stores in the second half of the outing. (Bit like half time at a rugby match!). Coffee shops and cafe’s started to pop up in the mall strips adjacent to the popular fashion stores to capture the feet mulling around the stores. Vida e  was one such coffee shop…