Spanish Retail: Pretencious, Expensive and Deceiving

Christmas holiday season in Spain is a big opportunity to explore local shopping and discover that it is not worth shopping here. Let´s see why local retail is not really competitive and what seems to be the commercial standard.

If you walk the commercial street of a city like Barcelona you´ll find many attractive images in advertising, promotional materials and events that encourage you to buy goods and services, many of them developed by international and local campaigns. Fresh food, fancy clothes, luxury experiences do not usually comply to WYSWYG policies. Let´s explore a bit further.

Under the slogan of Spain is Different Manuel Fraga, a dictator Franco´s  advisor promoted a country where because of "being different" tourist were forced to accept all kinds of outstandards, scams, and abuse in products and services, offered to them while visiting.

From this point many businesses have been inventing their own rules about prices, customer service, and product standards for years, when it comes to complying with quality and service, based on the belief, that people would buy anywy and they may not see them again.

But times change, prosumers grow and what worked for Mr. Fraga in the 60´s is now just "... a common phrase to joke about Spanish lousy mentality..." as Wikipedia notes about the campaign. Nowadays and after the economic crisis has made Spain fall into a new position in the world, all these beliefs are subject to change, hopefully...soon.

Shopping for goods at departments stores can give you surprises like sales people affirming that products you know and use, simply  do not exist in the market or things they just do not know, have apparenty never been built. These type of answers usually followed by "es lo que hay" (sort of "that is all you´ll get" ) leave you breathless and discourage to buy again or even try to buy.
Trying to find someone to give you information on options, colours, sizes, materials, functions or specifications will be useless unless you are lucky and find that the salesperson from abroad (usually Latinamerica, USA or Canary Islands), then you´ll have a smile and some assistance. Double priced products are found in most big stores, meaning that you may find the exact same item with two different prices at the same store or finding the same item at different prices in different shops located in different areas of the city. Be cautious with this.

I do have to admit, shop designers and marketeers do their job right, storefronts, ads, displays, shop-windows, catalogues and most websites are very seductive and  get us into the shops, but once you are inside,  another story is being told.

Overrated, overpriced and often crappy is the feeling of many visitors about their shopping and gastronomic experiences. 

If you plan to go for dinner, restaurants hold the same policy, do not expect to be well treated, you can easily wait at a bar for 15 minutes to be noticed by the waiter and once he/she arrives will just ask you what you want without bringing a menu or having a visible pricelist, the result : surpise bill with overspriced items. Very often charging extra for items you did not ask for or overcharging on drinks and coffee. If he menu has pictures on it , do not believe what you see because you´ll receive a whole different dish, no "serving suggestion" note is visible either. be ready to pay more for the same dish at night or if you choose a table outside. very good and expensive restaurants can be found across Barcelona but for me after almost 10 years around here it has been hard to find value for money.

I guess the Spanish fashion industry is a vivid example of what I am trying to expres here. Inditex found its way to global business, selling very low quality clothes, copied from real designers to be sold in pretencious shops that look like real fashion stores, located in big malls or fancy avenues.
Clothes from Zara, Mango, Oysho, Stradivarious or any of the brands from Inditex will luckily survive three time in the washing machine, even the Beijing Consumer Association has legally confronted Zara about bad quality in their products. Prices are good, but what about value for money? Has anyone ever heard about that here?

Why are Spaniards always trying to "Vender la Moto"? ( a very common expression when people suspect something is not as much as it is being described as).  These things permanently intrigue me and make wonder about how much of is cultural, just a national attitude, or a trace of collective identity.

I hope times change and a new generation of Spaniards will not repeat these traditions when making business, working with customers or developing a slogan that sells this country. It may be time for a change of mind, style and behaviour.

In a future post I´ll write about HQ Spanish products and companies, I promise.  For the time being, check out a couple of references on the current topic:

http://www.trendenciashombre.com/business/china-cuestiona-calidad-de-zara
http://www.terra.mx/mujer/articulo/1096703/ZARA+encabeza+lista+negra+de+ropa+de+mala+calidad+en+China.htm
http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Europe/Spain/Catalunya/Barcelona-274654/Tourist_Traps-Barcelona-TG-C-1.html
http://www.solchannel.com/andalucia/expat-life/expat-survival-guide/customer-service-in-spain-vi234.html

1€ for using the elevator

It sounds like a strange cocktail of provincialism, speculation and greed.

 Walking across Barcelona I recently found that the brand new Arenas Shopping Mall has taken the opportunity to charge its visitors for using the lift (1€ per ride). Locals, tourists and families gathered on a long line to use the elevator and the reach the upper terrace. Two guys from Arenas Staff charge and provide instructions of use to excited visitors willing to pay for this exciting adventure..

   

Then I wonder why could this be successfully happening in the first world( Europe) in the 21st century when elevators, lifts, and all other transportation devices are so common. I found out that it is because people is bored, ignorant and willing to pay for thing they already have. Buying the lift ride makes it exciting, because in our minds only those things we pay for are good and worthy. Free things like the air, water, nature and our own life and thoughts are just not so good enough  as to charge for them. 

Sadly, we live our lives convinced that only things we can buy are important and valuable. That is why speculation and scam are so successful these days. We feel we need to pay for things we already are entitled to.

Una nación virtual: maniplaciones politicas y engaño masivo

Es un tema sobre el cual no se por donde comenzar. Es difícil ver como la gente de Cataluña cree ciegamente en sus dirigente y darse cuenta  que estan siendo manipulados políticamente por una burguesía millonaria, corrupta y avariciosa; que mas que trabajar por la construcción de una nación y su cultura, como lo creen la mayoria de quienes les siguen,  ven un negocio redondo en la creación de su propio país.

No es un secreto para nadie que Cataluña es una región próspera que gracias a la industria el turismo y los negocios ha logrado promocionarse a nivel mundial como destino turístico, tierra mágica y libertaria y lugar de negocios. Desde épocas antiguas el comercio y el intercambio han hecho de la zona un lugar propicio para la riqueza. Sin embargo también hay que decir que esta riqueza se encuentra concentrada en una élite de familias que permanentemente se preocupan de mantener y aumentar su poder económico, político y cultural.

En pocas palabras me atrevo a decir que el nacionalismo surgido después de la caída de franco es una fabricación de una élite para crear hegemonía disfrazado de patriotismo y liberación.

Es muy fuerte ver dia a dia como gente del común esta convencida que el independentismo de catalunña es fruto de una necesidad social o cultural y no ven el negocio que implica para quienes en realidad se benefician de ello.


Una vida diaria y servicios sociales totalmente politizados cumplen la función de fabricar una sociedad endogámica que se cierra a si misma de tal manera que roza los bordes de la intolerancia y la radicalización.  Contratos públicos y subvenciones adjudicados por apellido, partido político o promesa electoral. Derechos humanos y sociales que se respetan o ignoran  dependendiendo de la raza, credo, orientación sexual, apellido, código de identificación o lengua materna del implicado.

Cada día vemos más adolescentes que se niegan a hablar otra cosa que catalán, racistas, machistas y llenos de sentimientos de rencor que han aprendido a través de los medios. la escuela y los programas sociales. Jóvenes que se quedarán en su barrio o pueblo, nunca accederán a un erasmus, a interrelacionarse con otras culturas o a entender el mundo y que abiertamente expresan que los inmigrantes son una escoria, la diversidad un estorbo y el nacionalismo lo mejor que le puede pasar a Catalunya.

Vemos ademas una Catalunya totamente institucionalizada, creativamente infertil, regulada por el dictamen de estamentos oficiales, con un poer de censura a traves de la financion publica rotundo, con una fuerza represiva y policial impresionante, un estado de vigilancia permanente y una aparente libertad de ideologia y credo que no existen.  Todo ello ejercido sobre una población historicamente sometida, ingenua y ansiosa de una ilusión de libertad y nación.

Me pregunto yo si estos jóvenes son los que construirán la nueva y tercera dictadura, mas violenta, mas invasiva y mas invisible que la actual..