Death of a shopping district – BCD retailers cry SOS

One week into the opposition demonstrations that effectively paralyzed commerce in the capital throughout much of December, a few hardy businesses in the Beirut Central District (BCD) cautiously opened their doors – despite the presence of the Lebanese Army and its armor, dogged protesters, and coils of razor wire – to holiday shoppers. They hung their Christmas decorations and slashed prices in a last ditch effort to woo shoppers. It capped off what has been, by all accounts, a disastrous six months for Lebanon’s luxury retail and hospitality sectors. Indeed, the commercial fortunes of tenants in the BCD, where rents average $1,000 dollars per square meter per year, have been in the epicenter of the bruising political events of the past two years that began with the assassination of Rafik Hariri. After bumper years in 2003 and 2004, the demos and funerals of 2005 saw business in the BCD drop