[caption id="attachment_109415" align="alignright" width="300"]
Christmas trees being sold down Havelock Road[/caption]
Christmas cheer this year may mean a lot more to many people than any other December this holiday season, and considering the year we have all lived through, we all deserve to celebrate and have a good time.
If you wander on to the streets of Pettah, the usual hotspots like Havelock Road, or certain areas in the Dehiwala and Wellawatte junctions, you will find that Christmas décor and tree vendors have returned as they normally would during the holiday season.
In Pettah especially, things really don’t appear to have slowed down. While this may also be cause for concern, with so many people gathering to one constricted area, it appeared as though everyone was adhering to the guidelines for the most part; washing hands, sanitising, and most importantly, wearing their masks.
We took a stroll down China Street and spoke to a few vendors along the way about how business has been this December and whether they’ve noticed any major shifts in the way that people celebrate Christmas in 2020.
At Party Villa King on China Street, a wholesale place which offers all sorts of Christmas-related items ranging from Christmas tree decorations like baubles and other trinkets, to lights, wreaths, giant Christmas trees, and even life-sized Santa Clauses, they shared that to them, since they are in Pettah, the biggest concern was safety as they are surrounded by high-risk zones.
He said that they were mostly worried about coming to work and carrying out their daily business activities while interacting with a whole host of people coming from all over the island as there really is no way of tracing or documenting them as they come and go.
However, they said that setting aside those worries, business really hasn’t been all that different except maybe the rush is a little less than it would usually be. Nevertheless, they said that it is still a little too early to tell. They shared that mostly, the Christmas rush comes in much later in the month, and it is usually a week of high-intensity, rushed sales. However, they expressed that offices and corporates have cut down on how big they want to go with decorations, so they assumed that there is some cost-cutting happening.
We also spoke to Sanjeewa Nanayakkara, who sets up shop in Dehiwala during Christmastime, and he said that his day job is actually driving a three-wheeler and that this year, he has defaulted in his payments and so he has had to give the three-wheeler back. Therefore, he decided to come and set up shop early this Christmas.
Sanjeewa shared that usually, Christmas shopping is a two-day activity in Colombo; if you are not a massive vendor who makes a big number of sales to companies, then your sales happen on 23 and 24 December and so, he cannot exactly say how things will go. He did however mention that what they do, ideally, is set up shop a week or two prior, so that people who commute on Galle Road are aware of the location they can purchase the items and when the time comes, they will come and buy from them.
He said that since they buy most of their items from Colombo itself, there hasn’t been a huge shift in prices and they have decided to stick to their ordinary prices. According to Sanjeewa, this way, they may suffer a small loss in profits but they cannot increase the prices as everyone is on a budget these days.
Milhan Vipula, who sells Christmas trees on Havelock Road, shared that this year, things have been very different for them. Havelock Road, being the hotspot for seasonal sales – rambutan during Avurudu, lanterns for Vesak, and of course trees for Christmas – Milhan said that this year they had many concerns about being able to set up shop as usual. He said that they briefly considered delivering the trees to people’s homes if lockdown was imposed. However, thankfully they were able to sell on the roadside.
He said that in any ordinary year, they would bring about 3,000-4,000 trees, but this year they brought a mere fraction of them – about 500 – as they have projected there to be very few sales as not a lot of people are wandering the streets this time around. He said that they usually purchase from a village in Bandarawela, which is where most of the Colombo vendors get their trees, and this year, there was a drought in the area and many trees had died, so they were able to cut down only a few that were salvageable.
Milhan said that this year, since the number of trees is so low and the expenses they had to incur in bringing the trees down from Bandarawela remained the same, the prices may have spiked slightly, and he is hopeful that the closer we get to Christmas, people will feel the urge to add some holiday cheer to their homes and come purchase a tree.
Christmas trees being sold down Havelock Road[/caption]
Christmas cheer this year may mean a lot more to many people than any other December this holiday season, and considering the year we have all lived through, we all deserve to celebrate and have a good time.
If you wander on to the streets of Pettah, the usual hotspots like Havelock Road, or certain areas in the Dehiwala and Wellawatte junctions, you will find that Christmas décor and tree vendors have returned as they normally would during the holiday season.
In Pettah especially, things really don’t appear to have slowed down. While this may also be cause for concern, with so many people gathering to one constricted area, it appeared as though everyone was adhering to the guidelines for the most part; washing hands, sanitising, and most importantly, wearing their masks.
We took a stroll down China Street and spoke to a few vendors along the way about how business has been this December and whether they’ve noticed any major shifts in the way that people celebrate Christmas in 2020.
At Party Villa King on China Street, a wholesale place which offers all sorts of Christmas-related items ranging from Christmas tree decorations like baubles and other trinkets, to lights, wreaths, giant Christmas trees, and even life-sized Santa Clauses, they shared that to them, since they are in Pettah, the biggest concern was safety as they are surrounded by high-risk zones.
He said that they were mostly worried about coming to work and carrying out their daily business activities while interacting with a whole host of people coming from all over the island as there really is no way of tracing or documenting them as they come and go.
However, they said that setting aside those worries, business really hasn’t been all that different except maybe the rush is a little less than it would usually be. Nevertheless, they said that it is still a little too early to tell. They shared that mostly, the Christmas rush comes in much later in the month, and it is usually a week of high-intensity, rushed sales. However, they expressed that offices and corporates have cut down on how big they want to go with decorations, so they assumed that there is some cost-cutting happening.
We also spoke to Sanjeewa Nanayakkara, who sets up shop in Dehiwala during Christmastime, and he said that his day job is actually driving a three-wheeler and that this year, he has defaulted in his payments and so he has had to give the three-wheeler back. Therefore, he decided to come and set up shop early this Christmas.
Sanjeewa shared that usually, Christmas shopping is a two-day activity in Colombo; if you are not a massive vendor who makes a big number of sales to companies, then your sales happen on 23 and 24 December and so, he cannot exactly say how things will go. He did however mention that what they do, ideally, is set up shop a week or two prior, so that people who commute on Galle Road are aware of the location they can purchase the items and when the time comes, they will come and buy from them.
He said that since they buy most of their items from Colombo itself, there hasn’t been a huge shift in prices and they have decided to stick to their ordinary prices. According to Sanjeewa, this way, they may suffer a small loss in profits but they cannot increase the prices as everyone is on a budget these days.
Milhan Vipula, who sells Christmas trees on Havelock Road, shared that this year, things have been very different for them. Havelock Road, being the hotspot for seasonal sales – rambutan during Avurudu, lanterns for Vesak, and of course trees for Christmas – Milhan said that this year they had many concerns about being able to set up shop as usual. He said that they briefly considered delivering the trees to people’s homes if lockdown was imposed. However, thankfully they were able to sell on the roadside.
He said that in any ordinary year, they would bring about 3,000-4,000 trees, but this year they brought a mere fraction of them – about 500 – as they have projected there to be very few sales as not a lot of people are wandering the streets this time around. He said that they usually purchase from a village in Bandarawela, which is where most of the Colombo vendors get their trees, and this year, there was a drought in the area and many trees had died, so they were able to cut down only a few that were salvageable.
Milhan said that this year, since the number of trees is so low and the expenses they had to incur in bringing the trees down from Bandarawela remained the same, the prices may have spiked slightly, and he is hopeful that the closer we get to Christmas, people will feel the urge to add some holiday cheer to their homes and come purchase a tree.