From the perspective of consumer markets in Lebanon today, there are two classes of people: 1, those who can no longer carry out basic transactions in a consumer economy, and 2, those who are lucky enough to still go shopping, without knowing how long their luck will last. The large and growing first group includes those residents who depend to varying but overall increasing degrees on food aid, and those store keepers who have been forced by the economic crisis to shutter their small stores. The number of destitute families today is innumerable in exact terms but assumed to be in the hundred thousands; the store shutdowns by many estimates are reaching up to 10,000 points of sales, numbering between one third and 40 percent of traditional retail outlets. Their retail experience is existentially nil. The second group, those who are still in luck of having access to printed paper
