Night shopping comes to city via Mumbai Fest '06

As part of the Mumbai Festival 2006, Mumbai Shopping Festival (MSF), a retail event, is set to bring the concept of 'Night Bazaar' in the city with more than 17,000 retail outlets across the city to remain open till 3 am.

It provides a big opportunity to Mumbaikars who cannot go for shopping during the busy day schedule. In its second year, the 13-day mega festival will starts on January 14.

Sankalp Entertainment is organising the shopping festival. Already 8,000 retail outlets have made registration, while the organisation is getting 700 new registrations everyday from the outlets wanting to become part of the festival.

"Our target is to have 17,000 retail outlets participate in the festival. However, more retail outlets are welcome," said Devendra Joshi, director, Sankalp.

"Nearly 28 big city malls will be participating in the festival including Raghuleela, Crossroads, InOrbit, Nirmal Lifestyles and R-Mall. Apart from this, there are 500 branded outlets, chain of departmental stores and other normal outlets participating in the festival," said Nitin Telang of Sankalp, who is looking after the retail participation in the festival.

At present, the malls are closed by 11 pm. However, the festival will give an extension of 4 hours. "With the number of hours for shopping going up by 4 hours, we are expecting a turnover of around Rs 150-160 crore during the festival," said Joshi.

While Mumbai Shopping Festival 2005 was south Mumbai-centric, the coming festival will cover the whole city and suburbs upto Dahisar and Mulund.

"In Mumbai, people do not get time to shop. Festival will provide them with an opportunity to shop in a relaxed manner," Joshi noted. "We are also getting calls for registration from Thane areas, but we would not be able to entertain them," he added.

Avid shoppers have the chance to grab 20 mega prizes and 35,000 consolation prizes worth Rs 4.5 crore via raffles and scratch cards in the festival. "We are taking a registration charge of Rs 750 per outlet. In return, the outlets are being offered 15 lakh raffle coupons at a cost of Rs 5 each," Joshi said.

Customers will have to put down their details and one copy of it will remain with them and other will be submitted to the outlet where the purchase will be done. There will be 20 collection centres across the city and the raffle draws will be on four days- January 17, 22, 26 and 29. Moreover, if someone is not lucky with his coupon in the first draw, there will be three more opportunities.

"We will not be dumping the coupons after every draw. These will remain valid for other draws," said Telang.

The festival will also be running a contest for the best decoration of outlets. The winner will be bagging a cash prize of Rs 25,000. Sponsors of the event include Pass Pass, Reliance Infocomm, Corporation Bank, HPCL and South African Beverages.

The festival is a partnership between public and private bodies. The state and the central government including defence authorities and the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) have extended support to the event.

"The main objective of the event is to place Mumbai on the global map as a shopping and cultural hub. It will not be brand-centric rather it will be Mumbai-centric," Joshi said.

Moonlight shopping

As many as 17,000 retail outlets to be opened till 3 am

Nearly 28 big city malls to participate including Raghuleela, Crossroads, InOrbit, Nirmal Lifestyles, R-Mall

During the festival retail outlets expect Rs 100 crore turnover