Visakhapatnam: Garment shops in the city are witnessing heavy crowds of customers with Sankranti just a couple of days away.
After having a bad sales period for six months due to Seemandhra agitations, the cloth shop owners are finally smiling this harvest season.
This is a season of festivals which usually keeps shop owners busy. The textiles shops begin their efforts to attract customers right from the second week of December before Christmas, New Year and continue till Sankranti.
Sandeep Kumar, owner of a retail garment shop in Dabagardens, said that they would put up a huge variety of collection of clothes for sale during the first week of December and the sale starts from the second week of the month. “We will have a splendid sale till Sankranti,” he said.
Compared with other festivals, Sankranti has an advantage of people spending more on shopping, say sources, where people buy two to three pairs of dresses to each member of their family.
So this is a crucial period for sales for a garment shop, says P.V. Prasad, a garment shop employee in Jagadamba junction.
He also added that they would make more sales during Sankranti than during the whole year. During this big season, small and medium cloth businesses have to compete with big and glitzy shops and malls.
How they cope with the competition depends on the discounts they provide to the customers. Small scale retail shops have been trying to compete with big brothers with variety of collections and discounts.
Sravan Kumar, a B. Tech student of Vitam College, feels that the discounts offered by the small garment shops are more attractive than the highly publicised big shops and the prices fit in his budget.
“Retail garments shops have a large variety of collections. I can grab two pairs for '2,000, which cannot be possible in big shopping malls,” he added. At the same time, electronic appliances shops and mobile showrooms are also seen packed with shoppers.
