Sidewalks transform into Tet shopping centers

Kiosks, mini shops and stalls have been popping up along streets and on sidewalks. Any empty space can be used to sell goods. The Tet market is heating up.

Obtaining a retail space is not easy, but it’s especially impossible now just one month before Tet.

Small merchants complain that they cannot find a place to sell their confectionaries, drinks, dried foods and clothes, the products most popular for Tet. Some believe it would be better to locate shops in residential quarters along their large sidewalks for motorbike parking.

Le Thu Hoai, a small Hanoi merchant, is looking for 10 square meters near Dong Xa Market to sell confectionary products, fruit jam and drinks. Hoai acknowledged that she cannot afford a large space, but reasonably-priced premises have been booked already.

Hoai suggested that idle spaces in Nghia Tan, Thanh Cong, Dinh Cong and Giang Vo residential areas would be ideal places for selling products, because consumers tend to make purchase at shops most convenient to them. Unfortunately, no such vacant spaces are open to small merchants.

Thao felt lucky when she successfully negotiated with a partner to share the same retail premises. The partner is selling dried foods for Tet, while Thao will sell motorbike helmets.

“I have to pay four million dong a month for seven square metres,” she admitted. “But it is good enough. No vacant place has been left for others.”

Hoai noted that people like her who lease retail spaces short term (only selling goods on the days before Tet) always pay higher rates than long term leasers.

“If long-term leasers pay five million dong a month, then you will have to pay seven million dong,” Hoai calculated.

Other sellers prefer setting up retail kiosks along streets and sidewalks, because they believe that they will catch the eyes of passersby more easily. Many sell their goods in the evenings, because motorbikes can only park on sidewalks at night. Therefore, Tet markets in Vietnam not only gather in the daytime, but during the evening hours as well.

VietNamNet/SGTT

Tags: Vietnam markets