Eid begins in the middle

By the middle of Ramadan the car park at a Jeddah mall is full at eleven at night, and the bags coming out have clothes in them.

Not groceries. Not dates, not juice, not the large pack for a table of twelve. Shoes, a dress, something for a boy who has grown since last year.

Retail has two Ramadans and they share a name. The first is about the table: the shopping is food, it is mostly done in the opening days, and it is decided by whoever cooks. The second is about Eid, which is expected at the very end of the month depending on the sighting, and it is bought late, at night, by the whole family at once.

Two customers, two jobs, two sets of copy. The shopkeepers know this. Every front table in the mall turns over in the second week.

The advertising does not turn over, and the reason is the film.

It was made in December, before the month began. It cost more than everything else in the plan put together: a director, a cast, a set built to look like a family home, several cuts and a version for each market. It is a good film. It is about the table.

So for the second half of the month the brand is talking about dates to a woman buying a dress, and the media weight behind that sentence is the heaviest it will be all year.

Nobody argues for it. Nobody has to. It cost too much to stop, and that is a different sentence from it is working. Only one of the two was ever measured.

The film is finished and paid for. The customer moved on the tenth night.