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The annual Dubai Shopping
Festival extravaganza has rapidly become an internationally-known
event, with thousands of bargains, draws, shows, promotions
and some of the world’s lowest prices.
In addition, the hotels and furnished apartments complexes offer
reduce accommodation rates, while Emirates offers great deals
on tickets.
Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF) started on February 15, 1996 as
a retail event intended to revitalise retail trade in Dubai,
United Arab Emirates. It has since been promoted as a tourist
attraction. This yearly month long event is usually scheduled
during the first quarter of the year, attracting about 3 million
people to Dubai. |
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It is the region’s
largest and longest running shopping and entertainment extravaganza.
DSF has had around 35 million visitors since 1996, who have
spent close to Dh74 billion in shopping malls, airlines, hotels
and entertainment outlets. In 2009 alone, visitors reached the
3.35 million mark and spent Dh9.8 billion in 32 days of the
festival.
During Dubai Shopping Festival, shops offer deep discounts on
their merchandise, daily car raffles are drawn, and fireworks
light Dubai’s night sky. Tourists from all around the
world are lured not only for Dubai's tax free shopping, but
also for all of the events that take place during the festival.
In 2006, the festival was cancelled due to the death of Dubai's
ruler, Sheikh Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum. In addition to
Dubai Shopping Festival, Dubai also hosts Dubai Summer Surprises.
Dubai is sometimes called the 'city of gold'. The city of gold
concept was coined during one of the Dubai Shopping Festival
awareness campaigns, In 1996, Dubai invited everyone from all
around the world to a global annual festival which came to be
named as the milestone "Dubai Shopping Festival" or
DSF, they came up with the novel idea of a global village, a
shopping village was conceived with all nations participating
with their wares and styles in their traditional or cultural
ways, the immigrant ex pat population and the fly in visitors
rejoiced in the celebration that took place and the promise
was given that from then on every year Dubai will host a festival
for people from all around the world. The years that followed
brought in more visitors more exhibitors and now the stage was
set to build on the reputation of hospitality.
Dubai shopping festival was segregated into many major attractions
all with one purpose, to have as many ways of entertaining the
guests to the city, and catering to each and every individual
segment's visiting from around the world, the loyalty of the
local expatriate populations definitely finds a reason to become
even more attached to the city that brings to them their own
culture every year.
Dubai Shopping Festival plays a vital role in Dubai's tourism
industry. Apart from the direct impact it has on the tourism
industry, Dubai Shopping Festival also contributes its share
of importance into the nervous system of the emirate. With the
rise of the number of visitors to Dubai for Dubai Shopping Festival,
lots of potential immigrant talent and investment get to experience
the luxury of Dubai. |
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