Istanbul shopping centers pin high hopes on New Year’s sales

Deniz Gürgen - ISTANBUL

A group of shoppers walk inside Istanbul’s 212 shopping mall yesterday. Turkey’s shopping centers have become a winter wonderland attracting holiday shoppers. DAILY NEWS photo, Emrah GÜREL

With New Year’s right around the corner, malls and shopping centers in Turkey are optimistic about lucrative holiday sales unlike their counterparts in crisis-hit Europe. 

“So far the shopping centers here haven’t witnessed dwindling sales during this holiday season. We are optimistically positive,” Mehmet Nane, head of the Shopping Centers and Retailers Association (AMPD), told the Hürriyet Daily News in an interview yesterday.
 However, the next two weeks will be critical in measuring the shopping appetite, said Nane, who also heads Teknosa, one of the leading local electronics retailers. Still, he said, shopping during the holiday season in Turkey is what he termed “seasonal” and does not seem to be affected by external conditions like the debt crisis in Europe.

Large shopping centers in Istanbul remain equally upbeat. 

“Of course the stores in our shopping center have high hopes for holiday sales,” Figen Peltek from Tepe Nautilus marketing and corporate communications department told the Daily News. “We believe these expectations will be met and there will be a pick-up in sales before the new year.” 
Nautilus on the Anatolian side of the city foresaw 2012 as being an even stronger year than 2011 given the shopping center’s various promotions and activities, she said. 
Istanbul’s Galleria shopping center has used 530 meters of holiday lights for its indoor and outdoor lighting to attract shoppers. In addition, it has decorated the mall with lighting to give the effect of dangling icicles, Anatolia news agency reported. 

Capitol shopping center on Istanbul’s Anatolian side has created a wonderland of gingerbread candy houses that are large enough to accommodate shoppers walking through and have intrigued both children and adults alike. 

The situation in Turkey stands in sharp contrast to Europe where shoppers have tightened their purse strings. 

Europeans will be trimming their spending on Christmas gifts, food and entertainment this year, according to Deloitte’s annual Christmas spending survey released over the weekend.

“Many shoppers this year find they need to consider their spending more astutely, reduce the number of people on their Christmas lists and turn to more practical and useful presents when gift giving,” the survey said.