Sana Safinaz: ‘Sold out’ in 60 seconds

Women descend on Sana Safinaz's latest collection in droves.

KARACHI: Unlike the brand’s summer collection, Sana Safinaz’s ready-to-wear Fall/Winter Collection 2010 was launched with a relativity lesser number of customers coming in. But almost the entire collection was sold out in the first one minute of its launch in Karachi, according to the Ensemble Pakistan store that exhibited the designer collection last Tuesday.

For Aymen Malik, a homemaker who has recently settled in Pakistan, the crowd size was beyond her expectations. “I have never seen anything like this before. I wasn’t expecting anything like this. It’s madness, it’s a rush,” she said.

Cars lined up outside Ensemble as women in queues  and waited for 5 pm, the time of the launch. As soon as the doors were opened, women rushed to the shelves, grabbing whatever came in their hands and headed towards the cash counters. Within 10 minutes, Shehrnaz Husain of Ensemble was heard saying, “All the pieces have been sold out except for this one on the mannequin!”

Noor Rehman was upset she got nothing for herself. Speaking to The Express Tribune, she said, “I came here at 5 pm sharp and look, this is almost finished. I came here to buy myself something but I guess I’m late. It’s insane — you come and then there is nothing left for you to buy, everything is sold out.”

The brand’s latest collection features flowy shirts featuring heavy embellishments of diamantes on the necklines, full or three quarter sleeves in a riot of colours.

Husain said, “We are the first to launch this collection, with the next exhibition to be held in Lahore. The collection deals with festive season and is basically for the wedding season. The prices are fairly reasonable keeping in mind that this is Sana Safinaz. Moreover consumers don’t have to wait because it is ready-to-wear and is free size. It is great value for money.”

As many as 105 pieces from the brand have been exhibited in Karachi and Lahore with outfits priced from Rs26,000 to Rs40,000.

When Safinaz Munir, not present at the event, was told about the whole collection being sold out within a few minutes, she said, “It’s wonderful. It’s good to know Pakistan is alive and kicking. It’s heartening to know. It’s good news for all the fashion designers that they are still [being able to sell like this].”

About the scope of her latest collection, Munir said, “This collection goes to India too It as well as Dubai, London and the US. We are expecting the same results in other cities.”

Zeba Husain of Ensemble said, “This happens every time we have a Sana Safinaz exhibition. We are very lucky to have them with us.”

A little before 6 pm, the last piece too was sold out and women were just placing orders for themselves with the promise from Ensemble that the items will be delivered to them after 30 days.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 2^nd, 2010.