Many markets for Vietnamese goods have been organized to stimulate shopping demand after natural disasters and pandemic.

Hue Big C Supermarket in December 2020 is quite crowded and bustling when businesses are deploying five promotions per week while transporting dozens of goods shipments to districts and towns, responding to the Vietnamese Goods Fair program launched by the Department of Industry and Trade.

According to Ms. Vo Thi Thu Thuy, the Director of Big C Hue, the survey showed that after the COVID-19 pandemic and the recent floods and storms, citizens had enormous consumption demand. Therefore, the Big C system has implemented many promotions and discounts up to 50% with five to six programs per week to stimulate demand for purchasing, which create opportunities for people to purchase essential goods for their consumer demand.

Ms. Thuy stated that with the aim for the customers to purchase goods at a reasonable price, her company has directly imported many items, such as poultry meat, fruits, cosmetics, etc., and worked with major suppliers in Vietnam to share difficulties and accompany consumers by cutting a portion of profits from each side. The implementation of the stimulus program to boost consumer spending at the end of the year aims to solve two problems including to consume agricultural products for farmers and bring benefits to consumers with many preferential prices.

After the COVID-19 pandemic, the purchasing power at supermarkets and retail stores in the area decreased by 10 to 25% compared to the time before the pandemic. It was partly some consumers still have had stockpiles from previous occasions, partly several have economic difficulties and they have to reduce their spending. It is also partly because the prices of some essential goods such as gasoline, pork, etc. have continuously increased and remained at a high price after the pandemic.

Many people are afraid that the market commodity prices will increase, so they are quite hesitant in spending. Therefore, promotion programs being promoted at this time have contributed to sharing difficulties with consumers and also increasing consumption for the market.

In localities in the province, such as Quang Dien, Nam Dong, Phu Loc, etc., from the end of November to the end of December 2020, many Vietnamese goods’ markets with promotion programs held by enterprises have been taken place. These activities have created a lively atmosphere and contributed to stimulating shopping demand with 100% of products to be sold in the market fair are committed to reducing prices from 10% to 40%.

A representative of Bao La Bamboo and Rattan Cooperative said that, after months of the COVID-19 outbreak and storms, handicraft products were consumed on-site slowly; as tourists to Hue decreased, the souvenir shops in which the products deposited by cooperatives were also dull. Therefore, the fairs of Vietnamese goods to the countryside and the cooperative’s participation in domestic fairs will contribute to helping enterprise’s products to be consumed and helping it signed interior and exterior decoration orders to maintain production and consumption of products.

Big C Hue implements 5 promotions per week at the same time, attracting customers to go shopping

According to Deputy Director of the Department of Industry and Trade Nguyen Luong Bay, the sales promotion month takes place from November 27th to December 27th, 2020 and Vietnamese goods fairs in localities in the province are organized in order to create conditions for local people to access Vietnamese goods with guaranteed quality, promotions and affordable prices, contributing to stimulating consumer demand and promoting production and circulation of goods.

Along with the implementation of programs to stimulate consumer demand, the Department of Industry and Trade mobilizes enterprises to participate in the international trade fair of the key economic region of the Central Region and Central Highlands in 2020, in conferences connecting the consumption of typical rural industrial goods and OCOP products, and local specialities held in the local area during December 2020.

From the beginning of the year up to now, there have been over 6,400 promotional programs of over 500 enterprises from Thua Thien Hue and other provinces implemented in the locality with a promotional value of over 4,700 billion VND. Among these, there are 150 enterprises participating in more than 1,500 promotions in many forms, such as discounts, gifts, gift vouchers and many other forms.

Story and photos: Thanh Huong