Clothing stores see ‘limited’ improvement in sales as Friday lockdown ends

AMMAN — The lifting of Friday lockdown has boosted foot traffic in clothing stores, resulting in a “limited” improvement in sales, according to Jordan’s Textile and Readymade Clothes Syndicate President Muneer Deyeh.

In remarks to The Jordan Times on Tuesday, Deyeh said that the Kingdom’s clothing industry still suffers from low consumer demand, due to the limited time allowed for the businesses to operate, but the lifting of the Friday lockdown has helped in keeping shops running smoothly, which resulted in reduced Thursday shopping.

“If Friday lockdown is not reinstated, the performance of the sector will improve by almost 15 per cent after a while,” Deyeh said, noting that “although stores are emptier than usual when compared with the same period of previous years, there have been some positive results”.

Nour Khalil, a clothing store manager, said that many Jordanians have turned to online shopping amid pandemic uncertainty, but on Friday and Saturday, large numbers of shoppers came back to stores.

At the start of the holy month of Ramadan stores were almost empty as most people spent most of their time in their jobs and doing errands, he said.

“Now people can go out on Fridays and prepare for Eid Al Fitr, without having to overburden themselves,” Khalil said.

Meanwhile, Saed Omar, owner of a clothing and footwear shop in Amman, said that he did not experience “significant” in-store sales as shoppers went to malls and large clothing stores on Friday and Saturday.

“Since the pandemic started, I have been focusing more on my store’s online presence, which helped me stay afloat,” Omar said, expressing hopes that the situation would get better soon.