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When Christmas shopping
in Paris you can save 10% and have an adventure while you are at it.
Not all shoppers can
take advantage of the discount. And not all of the Paris’ five major
department stores offer this instant savings for shoppers. As a
non-European Union passport holder, you can take advantage of the offer
at Samaritaine, Galeries Lafayette and Printemps.
Christmas shopping in
Paris on a Saturday evening is a challenge in and of itself. The
sidewalks are crowded with shoppers, yes, but they are also crowded with
every one of all ages mesmerized by the animated, holiday window
displays.
I set out at 5 p.m. for
what I thought would be an ordinary shopping experience: know the item,
know where to find it, buy it and be home way before the 7 p.m. closing
time. I was about to find out that this item, a Longchamp, zippered
backpack purse, in brown, would not be available everywhere. In
addition, the color brown has different shades and colors retire.
The adventure begins
Bazar de l'Hôtel
de Ville (BHV) is closest to my neighborhood. I was doing a favor
for my sister and headed out to BHV to look for the purse in the color
chocolate.
I was doing a favor for my
sister and headed out to BHV to look for the purse in the color
chocolate.
Being the first stop, when BHV
did not have it displayed, I didn’t worry. I had three more department
store to go and besides they do not have an instant discount card.
Samaritaine, my next stop on the metro line, offers not
only a card good until you decide to stop shopping in this lifetime,
they also have two Longchamp counters. How could I lose!? (Please note
that la Samaritaine closed its doors in 2005.)
“Do you have this purse in chocolate,” I asked. The
response sent me into a minor panic: "Ils vont arrêter cette couleur
là." (They are going to stop producing that color.) Samaritaine did
not have le Pliage ™ purse in "chocolat" at either
counter. Pause, PANIC!!!!
I now had a 50% chance of finding the purse.
The no. 7 metro at Samaritaine is a direct link to
boulevard Haussmann area where you will find Galeries Lafayette and
Printemps.
The Longchamp counter at Galeries Lafayette is carries a
white sign with a red dot that says: stand rouge which means that in
general discounts are not given. And they had the purse. But! The
leather flap was scratched. To buy or not to buy!
Focused, weaving through the crowds and working against
the ticking clock (the French do not fool around when it is time to
close stores and parks), I headed up the street to Printemps.
I found out that they had chocolate because the lady in
front of me asked if they had the exact same purse for which I was
looking in the exact same color!
The saleslady opened the drawer close to the floor.
As if looking into a filing cabinet full of plastic
wrapped Longchamp products, she fingered each file, moved each plastic
piece, looked at their UPC codes and pulled forth a chocolate bag.
“By any chance do you have another one,” I asked. She
looked and the answer came up negative. But, when she was finished with
this client, she would take a look downstairs. In the meantime, I would
check to make sure my Printemps discount card was still valid.
In this non-scientific case, two positives did not have a
resistance.
She found it and I bought it!
When I asked her about the color being discontinued, she
replied that it was the color truffe/truffle, a lighter shade of brown that was
discontinued.
The lady who picked up the other “chocolate” was
interested in my bag in the slate blue color. Unfortunately, that was
one of last year’s colors and no longer available.
If you would like a 10% discount card, take either your
passport or a photocopy to their store’s welcome desk or service desk.
There is nothing to fill out in order to obtain a card.
Happy Christmas shopping!
|
May 2008
