St Chris store wars!

House of Uniforms, one of Bahrain’s leading suppliers of school clothes, is staging a summer sale and trying to entice the parents from one top school back from a rival retailer with copies at cut prices.

St Christopher’s School teamed up with Zaks store to introduce a new look back in 2010 after 12 months of painstaking design work, sourcing material and even had its unique chosen tartan registered with the Scottish authorities.

House of Uniforms, the previous uniform suppliers, were not happy but have since been reassured by the Ministry of Education that there could be no exclusivity over selling school uniforms.

Yacoob Jawad , general manager of House of Uniforms, said: “Thankfully, in Bahrain every parent has a right to choose where to purchase their uniforms from, as long as the retailer follows the school’s strict uniform description.

“This encourages competition which is always great for our market – prices are reduced, more emphasis is made on quality and additional services offered. Overall, it supports a healthier business environment and gives customer satisfaction.”

He claims he has already undercut his rival’s prices and throughout June has been holding a ‘grand sale’ allowing customers to save up to a further 40 per cent on school wear. If a child experiences a growth spurt over the summer holidays the company will even exchange sale items in September.

House of Uniforms started as a single-shutter outlet employing three tailors and grew into a company employing up to 200 based in four locations, with three large manufacturing sister companies in China and India.

As well as covering the vast majority of the kingdom’s schools and exporting products to neighbouring Saudi Arabia, its new headquarters will open next year in Tala Place, Gudaibiya.

Zaks, however, remains confident its quality will win the day with design features on the trousers like a permanent crease stitch which helps ensure a crisp look even after the student has worn a pair for the whole day.

The company told GulfWeekly at the launch that the garments have been manufactured in the UAE and the fabrics have been imported from ‘ISO standard’ mills from around the world. 

The polo shirts, for example, are made of a quick-dry fabric. The woven fabrics have H20 dry out finishes and sweaters have pill troll fibre which avoids piling and are one third the weight of a regular sweater and specifically designed for the harsh Gulf climate. It was one of the first companies to introduce this for school students in the Middle East.

Principal Ed Goodwin acknowledged the development and insists all members of St Christopher’s Tartan Army must wear the same looking uniform, whoever the supplier, and that it is designed to abide by all school regulations in style and shape.

Senior members of staff took issue in the past when some pupils shortened the length of clothing and had uniforms tailored to be more figure-hugging.

One parent told GulfWeekly: “Competition is always good and if the quality of the school uniforms is similar I cannot see there being an issue and it should help keep prices competitive.”

During the promotion period prices of the St Christopher’s School uniforms differ across the board between the two stores, for example a blouse for a 14-year-old is priced at BD9 in Zaks and BD5.600 in House of Uniforms and a tie is BD5 in Zaks and BD2.800 in House of Uniforms.