I was walking through a mall in Cape Town yesterday and 90% of the shops had a “SALE” sign on their windows or doors. It really was no surprise seeing most of the shops having sale signs as January is usually the slowest month for retailers as consumers are very reluctant to buy due to lack of disposable income. So I decided to enter one of the clothing retail shops which displayed a sale sign. I was expecting a small section of the store to be on sale but to my amazement, every single product in the shop was on sale! Then I thought to myself that maybe they have just reduced the prices by a small fraction but after browsing through their clothes, I could see that some of the products were cut down by as much as 50%. Now this was a real sale.

It has been quite usual in South Africa for some not to go shopping during the Christmas period and rather wait for this January sale period where prices are at knock down prices. Retailers really do not have much of an option but to ‘slash’ prices in January. Reasons being they probably bought a lot of stock in anticipation for the Christmas sales and now they have to get rid of that excess stock. Or, the retailers are getting new stock for the New Year and thus have to find a way to clear up the shelves so they can have space to put up the new stock.

January has always been a tough month for retailers but for those consumers who still have a bit of money left over from Christmas, this is the best time to go shopping.

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