Category: Shopping

I noticed something recently with my Aramex Shop&Ship mailbox which actually pissed me off until I got a phone call awhile ago explaining to me what was going on. For the past two weeks I’ve been buying a lot of stuff from Amazon and eBay. The problem I was facing was that I would have lets say four packages in my US mailbox waiting to be shipped to Kuwait but then Aramex would only ship one of them. This usually happens during periods of time when people shop online a lot like before Christmas or Eid so it didn’t make sense why it was happening now. Now what confused me with all of this is that the rest of the packages ended up shipping the next day but then all four of my packages arrived to Kuwait at the same time. It didn’t really make any sense.

So after a few emails complaining I got a phone call today from Aramex and it turns out they’ve done something new. Basically they only have two cargo flights a week out of the US. This is why they ship the stuff to Kuwait twice a week. Two weeks ago they struck a deal with Kuwait Airways where they are now able to ship some items to Kuwait on their planes which from what I understood are daily flights. Aramex is limited by the kind of mail and the amount of mail they can ship on those flights so thats why they were “choosing” what to send from my packages. Anything that can’t be sent on those daily Kuwait Airways flights remains in the mailbox until a cargo plane is available to take them to Kuwait which is twice a week.

In short, some of the packages from now on will ship the day after they arrive to the box while others will continue to be shipped only twice a week. Thats pretty cool.

Note: For those of you who don’t know what Aramex Shop&Ship is, its a forwarding mailbox which Aramex sets up for you in the US or the UK and any package that gets sent to that mailbox gets forwarded to you here in Kuwait.

There is a Lamborghini Diablo for sale on Q8Car for only KD14,500. I think that’s not a bad deal although I am not too fond of the color. [Link]

Asking price? A ridiculous KD20,000! You could probably buy two from eBay for that price and ship them to Kuwait (ok maybe not two but still) or just wait until the local dealer gets them and sells them for around KD11,000. [Link]

I found out about this online BBQ store from Buzberry and I think the idea is pretty interesting. But there are a few things I would fix like adding pictures of the products, better descriptions, decreasing the delivery time to a few hours instead of 48hours, and lowering the minimum order down to KD5 or something instead of the current KD20. Adding an option to have them BBQ the stuff for you in case you don’t want to go through the hassle of doing it yourself would also be cool. [Link]

I finally got to pass by the new Sultan Center branch in Hawalli. First I have to say the location is crap since its located in traffic hell Hawalli, also if there is anything going on at the stadium next door don’t even think about passing by this branch since the stadium and Sultan Center share the same parking lot.

On the other hand the supermarket itself has really wide aisles and everything is nicely spread out. They seem to have more varied products compared to the main Salmiya branch but thats probably because they can fit more stuff. I think I’m going to do all my shopping at this branch from now on. Here is a link with a map and more info. [Link]

A reader emailed me a link to a Kuwaiti online sex shop. I spent a bit of time on the site trying to find something PG rated I could attach to this post but had problems finding something. They have vibrators, S&M stuff, costumes, creams and a ton of other random stuff. I am guessing this stuff is illegal in Kuwait and that someone is going to get into a bit of trouble now… [Link]

Thanks yaki-CHAN!

A reader sent me pictures of two Samsonite Swarovski Edition bags which a Samsonite representative dropped off to him. The smaller bag is going for KD3,500 while the larger one is priced at KD7,000. You can check out the pictures he sent me by clicking on continue below.

Thanks Karim!

I love watches so when the owner of Q8 Chrono emailed me the link to his site I quickly went to check it out. It’s kinda like Q8car.com except for watches or at least thats the kind of site I hope it turns into. The site lists a lot of new watches and also around 20 used watches (which is my favorite section). There is a pretty decent used watches market in Kuwait but all the stores that sell them are scattered around Kuwait. Having them all online on one site would be pretty practical. The site is still being worked on and the owner still has many things he wants to implement but for now you can check the site by going to Q8chrono.com

I hope the used section gets updated often and there should be a way of contacting the site if I want to sell a watch or maybe an automated form? I also just realized the used watches section is 2 pages long, you need to click on older entries at the bottom to get to the second page. Not very practical, he should ditch wordpress and set up a proper e-commerce site.

Update: Ok found the contact information, it was on the main page but there should be a link to the contact info on every page.

K5 has an interesting post about this cool little store he found called Nawader Al Kuwait. The place has a huge collection of vintage Arabic vinyl records and also vintage radios and record players. The place also has other random items, personally I am interested in the painting of the musicians above so I might pass by tonight to check the place out. You can see more pictures and information about the place on K5’s blog [Here]

Géant hypermarket will be opening in Kuwait at the 360 degrees mall in June 2009. Although Sultan Center purchased and took over the Géant franchise in Lebanon, Tamdeen Group will own the Géant chain in Kuwait.

Thanks YBhatti!

I picked up the latest issue of brownbook and they had an article on Kuwait’s online fashion market mentioning how there were nearly 60 online stores and highlighting their favorite 7. Here they are:

1. www.gojiboutique.com
2. www.krayvstore.com
3. www.cash-art.com
4. www.q8-fashion.com
5. www.butterfly-g.com
6. www.pinkmoonboutique.com
7. www.labiella.com

British Airways have amazing offers on their flights to London. A round trip economy ticket to London is for only KD140 with tax while a round trip Business Class ticket is now only KD512 with tax. Those are really great prices. [Link]

Here is a screen shot of the economy class price [Picture]
Here is a screen shot of the business class price [Picture]

Brands for Less is a store located in Salmiya opposite Eureka and NBK. Although they’ve been open for around 2 years now yesterday was the first time I passed by. Nat wanted a kitchen scale and she had heard there was a good one at Brands for Less so we went to check it out. The place although not very big was surprisingly interesting. They had a clothes and shoes section but I stayed downstairs where they had on display various electronics, stuff for the house and just really random stuff. I am trying to name some of the random items I saw but they’re just too many to list out. I mean they even have a unicycle!

The prices are very cheap, the cheapest I’ve seen in the market for what I was looking for and everything or at least the majority of the items were a German brand called Tchibo. All the product descriptions on the packages were also in German so its recommended you take a German speaking friend along. I ended up leaving with a few items my favorite being an Ethernet-Over-Power setup. The package came with three wall adapters and it cost me only KD13! Thats very cheap and although all the instructions were in German I didn’t need to set them up, they worked perfectly out of the box. There was only one more left so if you interested you need to hurry up.

I highly recommend anyone who loves places that carry random stuff to pass by. They’re located in Salmiya and their number is 25752456.

This product by Zippo is perfect for the current cold weather since its made to keep your hands warm. I think two of these would be perfect since you could shove each one in a pocket and then put your hands in and wrap them around the warmers. I don’t know if they sell them in Kuwait but on Amazon it goes for around KD5 without the lighter fluid which makes it Shop&Ship friendly.

Here is a link to the Zippo Hand Warmer product page [Link]
Here it is on Amazon [Link]

If you have an iPhone I highly recommend you get the Amazon app. Along with a fast and easy to use search feature, Amazon have included an amazing service called Amazon Remembers. Say while over at your friends place or while out shopping you found something you’re interested in, maybe its a CD, or a TV or as in my case a book, all you need to do is snap a picture of the item with the iPhone and the Amazon app uploads it online where a community of people research your photo and try to find the same product on Amazon.com. I just tried it now with a book I was interested and by the time I got home I had already received an email with a link to the product on Amazon.

Update: Just for the fun of it I took a picture of my dog eating his bone with the app and it got sent to Amazon. A few minutes later I got an email back pointing me towards a dog bone on Amazon! Amazing stuff, they’ve got a great sense of humor!!