BEIRUT: Nadine parked her elegant Jaguar in Downtown’s posh Allenby Street one recent afternoon to walk by the luxurious shops in that area and buy an expensive purse that could go with a dress she is planning to wear to her sister’s wedding.

“I can’t attend my sister’s wedding with a regular purse just like anyone else,” she said. “It has to be very unique.” Nadine doesn’t have a problem spending up to $5,000 on a Chanel purse for the sake of preserving a good social image among her friends and family.

“My husband is financially very well capable of providing me with an exceptional lifestyle. Why would I want to give it up?” She asked. “God bless my husband.”

But Nadine was one of only a very limited number of customers walking that day in Allenby, a street populated with high-end luxury brand stores such as Louis Vuitton and Georgio Armani.

Rather, Allenby Street was crowded with employees of banks and business institutions located in that area while high-end boutiques suffered from an obvious lack of customers.

Managers and owners of these extravagant shops have all reported a remarkable drop in sales since the collapse of Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s government and the beginning of heavy political bickering over the formation of a new Cabinet for the past four months.

“Political bickering is having a great impact on our business because we usually depend heavily on the Lebanese diaspora, and as you can see they [Lebanese visitors] are very rare this year,” said Violette Chammas, owner of Chanel in Lebanon. “We cannot take this anymore.”

Chammas said she might be able to cover her boutique’s expenses for the coming two months, but has doubts over her ability to survive in the market if the situation remains the same during this summer.

“I call upon our politicians to forget for once about their differences and direct their attention to the interests of our economy instead,” she said while holding a stack of her product catalogues to be sent to her loyal clients in hopes of bringing back whatever business she can get.

Chammas’ concerns were echoed by Claude Abou Chaar, manager of Karen Millen, a women’s designer clothing brand with three branches in Lebanon. “We have realized a great slowdown in our business since the collapse of the previous government as clients no longer feel at ease buying like they used to do before,” said Abou Chaar.

“Each of our clients used to buy two or three items of our products but now they’d rather limit their purchases to their needs only.”

Abou Chaar also attributed the slowdown to the unrest prevailing in the neighboring Arab countries. “A good number of our clients used to come from Syria and Jordan, but this is not the case anymore,” she said.

She explained that the owner of Karen Millen in Lebanon is also the owner of a store called Pink Powder operating in Beirut Souks and which sells multi-brands as well. “Pink Powder is not attracting any business at all these days and we might be considering closing this shop very soon,” she said.

The beginning of the summer season in Lebanon usually witnesses the release of a new collection of clothes and accessories by stores across Beirut at very high prices with no sales or promotions before the month of July.

But Gianfranco Ferre this year has already placed a huge 80 percent sale tag on its window.

“We want to get rid of our old collection for now,” said the shop manager, who declined to give his name.

“We are not planning on releasing any new collections for now because the company is facing some financial difficulties worldwide,” he said while refusing to give any further information.

However, the 80 percent slash in prices at Ferre did not seem to be of any help in attracting customers as the shop seemed to be totally deserted.

Hugo Boss manager Talal Kardali believes business in Downtown in general has also been negatively impacted by the location of the Parliament in that area. “They always close roads for security reasons in this area and this is affecting us a lot,” he said.

Kardali noticed a 30 percent drop in sales at Hugo Boss this year compared to the same period last year, and said that the owners of the shop have decided to postpone redecoration of the boutique until next year in anticipation of political or security problems.

He added that their branch in Beirut Souks is witnessing an incredible slowdown, while rent there is $13,000 per month. “If the situation does not improve soon, we might have to close our boutique there because our daily accounting records close at 0 sometimes,” he said.

While some of the stores at Beirut Souks have been deserted over the past few months amid the political crisis in the country, a few other popular boutiques such as Zara and Mango seemed to be doing well.

Shoppers visiting stores with moderately priced clothes are seen coming out with plenty of bags in their hands most of the time.

“My favorite is Zara because it has nice and affordable items,” said Iman, adding that her monthly income does not exceed $1,000. “I don’t even think of going into shops such as Chanel or similar brands stores. I can’t even dream of buying a Chanel handbag with my salary.”

The problems with luxury brand items is that they only target the wealthy upper class of the society, satisfying a “happy few,” explained Eva Jaffal, manager and partner at Sandra G, a local producer of luxury handbags and purses.

Jaffal is an ESA MBA graduate whose thesis focused on a recent strategy adopted by some luxury brand shops outlets aimed at allowing the “happy many” to luxurious items by launching a set of products accessible by a wider class of the society.

“Luxury brand shops are obliged today to diversify their products in order to be able to reach a wide layer of the society,” she said.

“However, doing so, these stores are faced with the challenge of not losing their image as luxury and high end shops,” Jaffal added.