Category: Gossip & Rumors

According to a reliable source, Spinneys, the popular supermarket chain, might be coming to Kuwait and partnering up with Alshaya.

Spinneys is considered a premium supermarket and is popular in the UAE and Lebanon, with locations also in Egypt, Oman, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. In the UAE, Spinneys also operates the Waitrose brand.

This isn’t the first time Alshaya has been in talks to partner with a supermarket chain. Back in 2011, they were reportedly in talks with Tesco before that deal fell through. At the time, I was told Alshaya was looking to replace Carrefour in The Avenues with their own supermarket concept. I have no idea if that’s still the case, but I’d imagine that would be the most likely scenario.

I’m filing this under rumors since the two sources I heard this from aren’t directly involved in the project, but I feel confident it’s actually happening. Supposedly, Topgolf is opening in Kuwait and will be part of the Sahara Kuwait Golf Resort.

There’s already a Topgolf open in Dubai and three planned for Saudi Arabia, so it’s not far fetched that one would be coming to Kuwait.

Topgolf is a driving range meets arcade, where you hit microchipped balls at giant targets to score points based on accuracy and distance. It’s less about golfing skills and more about having fun and hanging out with friends. There’s usually food and lots of drinking involved.

I reached out to Topgolf Dubai to see if they knew anything and was told they haven’t made any official announcements yet, but recommended I stay tuned to their official channels. When I pestered them a bit for any kind of info, they told me they’d spill the tea the moment they can. So I’m taking that as a sign that it’s happening, but they can’t say anything until it’s officially announced.

I also reached out to Ben Sharpe, the president and managing director for Topgolf Callaway Brands EMEA, but as of right now, I haven’t heard back from him yet.

Since we’re on the subject of golf, can someone please build a huge indoor miniature golf course as well? Thanks.

First image by @es_dubai, the second from @topgolfdubai

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Came across this bit of drama on tiktok yesterday. Seems a local influencer is being accused of copying someone else’s product. The product copied is something called Lippy Links and the inventor published a video calling out the influencer. The video has 138K views on instagram and over 3 million views on tiktok.

I thought that was pretty standard since copying is fairly common here. But then I watched another video by @rise_kw where he highlights the fact the influencer had published a video detailing her struggles trying to create the Gummy Links. Now watching the video below I would imagine the video is embarrassing but I’m assuming she doesn’t care because the video is still up.

So much drama.

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According to a contact of mine, Wingstop, the popular chicken wings chain will be opening in less than two weeks!

They have two locations under construction, but the one in Bid’a will be the one opening first. The second location in Salmiya will open at a later date.

Their Instagram account is now active as well so if you want to stay posted on their opening follow them @wingstopkuwait

Although not confirmed yet, I have it on good authority that Dean & Deluca in The Avenues will be closing down, and Ulta Beauty will be opening in its spot.

The location is pretty huge, which is a good thing since Ulta Beauty needs the space to fit its wide range of luxury, drugstore, and indie brands. It also has in-store salons offering services like haircuts, styling, facials, and brow treatments. With so much to offer, they should have no trouble making full use of the space.

The first Ulta Beauty location is expected to open this year.

Debenhams also seems to be closing, and while I don’t have any information about that location, it wouldn’t be surprising if Alshaya’s other new brand, Primark, takes over the space.

I try not to post too many food posts back to back, but this one couldn’t wait. According to a source of mine, La Petite Maison (LPM), the popular high-end French Mediterranean restaurant, is planning to open in Kuwait. Supposedly, the same company that brought Beefbar, Ferdi, and Philippe by Philippe Chow to Kuwait is now bringing LPM.

Since opening in London in 2007, LPM has expanded to 10 locations worldwide, including Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, and Doha.

I reached out to both parties for confirmation. The Kuwait-based company told me they’d update me in a couple of weeks, while LPM said they can’t confirm anything for Kuwait just yet.

“Just yet” sounds promising, so hopefully, an official announcement is coming soon. For now, I’ve filed this under a rumor. @lpmrestaurants

Update: According to a reader who just messaged me, looks like LPM are coming to Kuwait because they were in negotiations for a seaside location.

According to a contact of mine, Alshaya is bringing Ulta Beauty, one of the most popular beauty retailers in the U.S., to Kuwait and the region.

Ulta Beauty is known for offering a mix of luxury, drugstore, and indie brands all under one roof. Unlike Sephora, which focuses mainly on high-end products, Ulta carries everything from Dior and MAC to NYX and Maybelline. Another major draw is its in-store salons, offering services like haircuts, styling, facials, and brow treatments—something unique for a beauty retailer.

If this story turns out to be true, then it will be Ulta Beauty’s first location outside the U.S., as the brand currently operates only in its home market.

I’ve reached out to Alshaya for confirmation on this rumor but haven’t heard back from them yet.

Note: I was close to not posting this since I’d never heard of the brand and didn’t think people would care but in less than 25 minutes it’s already gotten over 1,000 likes on Instagram.

Update: It’s official, first location expected to open end of the year.

Talk about an unexpected collab, I just found out that Yelo! Pizza is teaming up with Caesars for a limited-edition pizza that will be available only on Jahez. I wasn’t shared a launch date, but was told it would be happening soon.

My guess is it’s Caesars sized Yelo! Pizzas, or maybe Caesars pizza dough with Yelo! Pizza’s toppings, should be cool either way.

My internet has been super slow all day and seems I’m not alone. According to a Reddit user, @Kuwait_anon, the GCX/Falcon cable system is down which is causing significant internet outage in Kuwait. The GCX/Falcon undersea cable system serves as a vital international data route connecting the Middle East to global networks.

I haven’t been able to find another source for this information. Citra doesn’t have any details, and neither does my internet provider, Zain. However, based on how slow my internet has been today, having major undersea cables down could explain why.

It looks like Lindsay Lohan is in Kuwait for the holidays. Lindsay was spotted by music teacher @fai_sms at the Lebanese restaurant Ibn El Jabal in Kuwait City.

In case you haven’t heard, Lindsay Lohan married Kuwaiti financier Bader Shammas a couple of years ago, which means she pops into Kuwait every so often. It’s pretty surreal—and the only way it could get more tabloid-worthy is if Al Pacino decided to spend New Year’s in Kuwait with his Kuwaiti girlfriend.

This is pretty disappointing news but it doesn’t look like there will be track days this year at Kuwait Motor Town. Supposedly the contract with the company that was running KMT expired and it wasn’t renewed and neither does anyone else seem to want to run it. So all events that were scheduled to take place at the race track were canceled and there won’t be any open track days until a new company takes over. Sucks.

According to a contact of mine, Alshaya are bringing Primark, the popular multinational fashion retailer to Kuwait and the Middle East GCC.

Primark is known for offering affordable, fast fashion and a wide range of clothing, accessories, and home goods. The brand is particularly popular for its trendy styles at low prices, appealing to budget-conscious shoppers.

I don’t have any idea on when they’re planning to open their first location, but I’d imagine they would need at the very least a year. I’ll update this post if I discover more.

<strong>Update: It’s now official.

There is a rumor going around that Lana Del Rey is planning to come to Kuwait and perform as part of her Middle East tour. Turns out the rumor originated from a couple of popular instagram accounts that posted an audio file where Lana supposedly mentions she will be performing in Kuwait and Qatar. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but that’s not true.

The audio file is actually from a really old Lana Del Rey interview with an Australian radio station from back in 2015. The funny thing is, Lana doesn’t even say she is coming to Kuwait. During the interview Lana mentions that if she was going to do another real tour, Australia would be one of the first places she would think of, other than the Middle East. When the host asks where she would like to tour in the Middle East, Lana then mentions she’d like to perform in Kuwait and Qatar.

You can hear the audio snippet that has been going around above. Don’t believe everything you read online, even if they have over 100,000 followers.

Over the weekend there was a bit of drama in Kuwait. Word got out that a PlayBoy model called Lina Bourghol was in Kuwait last week, and although it didn’t look like she did anything wrong while here, she still managed to ruffle some feathers.

Lina posted a photo of her in front of the Kuwait Towers which exacerbated the controversy. That photo now has over 3,000 likes but no comments since she closed it due to the abuse she was getting. In a video that popped up on my Tiktok feed she mentions that she doesn’t understand why authorities had a problem with her being in Kuwait, but were fine with Kim Kardashian being here. She denied that she was here because a guy paid her to come, and she brought up a good point that why would he bring her to Kuwait when they could fly out to a more interesting play like Miami. She said she came in here on a visit visa and that she wore the abaya everywhere she went out of respect for the local culture.

In any case she ended up leaving Kuwait, some people were saying she got deported but she mentions in her video she had left on her free will. The whole coming in on a visit visa thing I can believe since every now and then Tiktok pops up videos on my feed of what I assume are escorts temporarily in Kuwait. Don’t think there is a way to stop them from coming in unless you stop issuing visit visas completely.

Over the past couple of days there have been rumors floating around about Elon Musk coming to Kuwait. It’s being reported by some local news sites which I hadn’t heard of before, which is why I’m marking this as a rumor for now.

Allegedly, Elon Musk is expected to visit Kuwait in the next few days for discussions aimed at establishing Kuwait as a global hub for artificial intelligence.

This is where things gets strange, there is a secretive GPU cloud startup in Kuwait called Omniva that have plans to build a huge data center in Kuwait. The company is headed by big names who came in from companies like Amazon AWS, META and Microsoft. The data center which is under construction is located at the entrance of Sabah Al Ahmad Sea City (Road 278). source

I reached out to Elon Musk and Omniva to confirm all this, but I haven’t heard back from them yet.