BARGAIN BAZAAR BRINGS IN NEW YEAR

On the afternoon of Sunday, August 31, 2014, Ethiopia Diriba, a mother of two, was at the Addis Abeba Exhibition & Marketing Development Enterprise (AAEMDE) in Meskel Square with her sister and two children for the “Addis Trade Development” New Year Bazaar – a trade fair and New Year’s festival.

When Ethiopia came to the bazaar, she only expected to visit the exhibition. But, her expectations were unmatched by the reality she faced inside. The clothes she found in the market have real discounts of up to 50 Br. The bag she found at the one of the booths was appealing in both price and quality. She still had some money left after buying sweaters and shirts for her children. The jeans of her choice, which were being sold at an affordable price of 230 Br, also caught her eye.

She bought two sweaters for 300 Br and two shirts for 280 Br. She also purchased the same two bags for herself and her sister. At this point, her money was finally dwindling, and she wasn’t able to afford the jeans.

It was after realising that she was almost running out of money that she remembered seeing a Commercial Bank of Ethiopia (CBE) Automatic Teller Machine (ATM). She had her card with her and could have withdrawn money, but unfortunately the ATM was not working.

“I will return back tomorrow or another day before the bazaar closed,” she said.

With the money she had left in her pocket, she bought chocolates for her children and left the compound in the hope that she would find the jeans of her choise when she returns to the bazaar.

This New Year, 315 exhibitors have registered to participate, 35 less than the Easter holiday exhibition held in April, 2014, which was also organised by Century Promotion Services, managed by Zewge Jemane. These participants are spread out across three pavilions, where it costs 140 Br to 145 Br a square metre per day to rent out space. This is an increase of 20 Br to 25 Br from the Easter bazaar. Participants also have a cheaper option, with booths right outside the pavilions, where the price per square metre runs at 100 Br, up by 15 Br from the previous holiday. An additional 2,000 Br is also required as registration fees.

“The price change came from the abnormal price increment by the organisers during the bazaar’s tender,” Zewge told Fortune.

There is a maximum limit of exhibitors who can display their commodities in the space provided by Century in the exhibition centre. Pavilion One can hold ninety of the minimum sized booths (though most rent larger sized spaces), whereas Pavilions Two and Three hold 48 booths each. The space outside can hold up to 140 booths.

From the 315 participants, 57 of them are from the manufacturing sector, with local, as well as foreign companies including Turkey and India. There are seventy local agents selling imported brand products and 15 service providers. The remainders are retailers who are part of the exhibition, according to Zewge.

According to a survey of the exhibition centre, holiday bazaars are visited by 315,000 people on average, each paying a 10 Br entrance fee. The exhibition centre, established in 1983, has been under the management of the Addis Abeba Chamber of Commerce & Sectoral Association (AACCSA) under a 10 year contract with the Addis Ababa City Administration Trade and Investment Bureau since November 2005.

Erun Kumer, an Indian national who came to Ethiopia for the exhibition, rented nine booths to sell women’ clothes; kitchen materials, such as vegetable slicers and mechanical onion dicers; shoes, socks, garments and cotton, with his younger brother. He is very disappointed with his first experience in Ethiopia, due to the limited demand from the visitors for his products.

“I have exhibited my Pakistan made female leather shoes in different African countries, including Ghana and Senegal, and almost sold out my items, but the demand is too low here,” claims Erun.

He was selling slippers and flat shoes for 300 Br and 400 Br, respectively.

Selamawit Yared, 26, a Bank accountant likes the slippers.

“They are comfortable and the designs are different from the slippers sold in the local market,” she said.

Another newcomer to the bazaar was Fine Italian Ice-Cream, which was selling an Ice-cream for 25 Br and cotton candy for 15 Br. They were disappointed by the rain, which made demands for their weather sensitive products very low.

“The demand for cold things will be less during the rain, so we have managed to have buyers only on two days from our 10 days of participation,” claims a saleswoman of Fine.

Unlike Erun and Fine, Sheba Leather Industries, which offered a 20pc to 50pc discount on its locally made shoes – with prices ranging from 150 Br to 668 Br, was enjoying an abundance of visitors. Like Sheba, Repi Soap and Detergent S.C was also enjoying the business, finishing 800 packs of liquid detergent within two days, according to Mohammed Ahmed, a salesperson at Repi.

Another company, Ambassador Garment & Trade Plc, provided a 50pc discount, with 5,000 suits sold out within seven days. They also came with another discount rate of 1,500 Br for a 2,800 Br suit.

One aspect that stands out as peculiar in the 19-day bazaar is the disparity between male and female customers. Right from the main gate, where tickets are sold for 10 Br each, women, particularly young ones, are seen. Inside too, women predominantly stand out in the crowd of people.

Beyond the marketers, the CBE and Nib International Bank (NIB) were also exhibiting, enabling visitors to open accounts, change currencies and deposit cash. Others were enjoying the bazaar playing hide and seek with the security; this includes mobile card vendors and those begging inside the bazaar.

At another booth, Hagos Tadesse, a sales supervisor at Fafa Foods S.C – a producer of powdered milk and three types of baby food, is paying 18,000 Br for the nine square metre space, which it has been using for several years. Fafa paid 14,000 Br for the same booth before a couple of bazaars, but this has increased progressively through time.

The company is selling the products at retail price as an advertising opportunity for the company to reach to the masses, according to Hagos.

“Now it is better to advertise ourselves through the broadcast media, where we can reach the whole of Ethiopia at once,” he complains. “This price increment should be considered by the organizsers.”

Century also organised last year’s New Year’s bazaar, winning a tender with a financial offer of 4.9 million Br. This year’s price was 6.5 million Br. It had bid and won the tenders for the 2012/13 Christmas and Easter exhibitions at a combined sum of seven million Br, with this year’s offer for a single holiday bazaar only half a million birr less than this combined price.

The total cost of the bazaar reached to 9.14 million Br, including promotion and entertainment costs, according to Zewge.

“The Addis Abeba City Administration (AACA) and the AACCSA really should do something about the exhibition centre, which is becoming insufficient in accommodating the growing number of participants,” Zewge says. “We registered 120 companies, including 40 Sudanese companies, who cannot get a booth because they came late.”

He will soon have another opportunity, as Century has just recently won the bid to host the 2015 Easter exhibition, offering 3.8 million Br. This was despite being beaten by Shakanai General Business Trading, which was controversially awarded the busier Christmas event, offering 6.1 million Br.

When the night time draws in, the crowd gathers around the stage set up at the exterior of the complex to view shows by different dancers and the Zagol Band. In addition to the entertainment, the visitors also hope to be one of the four winners who will get electronics products in a raffle. There are also four competitor beer factories circulating the stage.

Several food tents are open to visitors, providing a variety of cuisine and, of course, Tej, a local homemade honey Meade.

The four breweries, including BGI Ethiopia, Harer, Bedele and Meta, were also entertaining the market with almost same price of 12 Br a cup of draught beer and 15 Br for a bottle, with a daily sale of six to 10 gallons of draught and 10 to 20 creates of beer. The beer companies were offered a deal to pay just for a 90sqm plot from the total 160sqm area they are using, with a payment of 300,000 Br each.

Century, which was established in 1991, has organised 21 exhibitions in connection with the celebration of major Ethiopian holidays, in addition to various trade fairs and fundraising events.

Zeweg has witnessed the development of the sector.

“When I started the business, I managed to get only 30 companies to participate,” he said. “But now we cannot manage to accommodate all of the companies who came here to take part in the exhibition. We planned to have 15,000 visitors a day, exceeding the registered highest number of 13,100 visitors a day.”

Tamirat Admassu, general manger of the exhibition centre, shares the concern of the Zewge.

“The space limitation of the centre is recognised by the management and we are working on having another exhibition centre,” he said.

The problems of space scarcity will hopefully be solved by the collaboration work of the AACCSA and the AACA on the establishment of the Addis Africa International Convention & Exhibition Centre SC (AAICEC). The City Administration will contribute 32 million Br to the Company, which was legally registered on November 13, 2012, and planned to commence the construction of its first phase by September, 2014. The project site is located in Yeka Sub City, the area locally known as Meri Lukie, along the Megenagna-Ayat Boulevard.


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