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In just the past few weeks alone, two other famous top-tier fashion houses have opened lavish boutiques at The Pearl-Qatar's Porto Arabia - Rene Caovilla and Vera Wang. Among the legendary brands already open at The Pearl-Qatar are Hermes, Giorgio Armani, Stella McCarthy, Roberto Cavalli, Chole, John Galliano, Alexandra McQueen, Missoni, Gianfranco Ferre, Stefano Ricci and Domenico Vacca to name but a few.
To Doha's dazzling construction industry and its legendary oil and natural gas sector, has now been added haute couture, as the world's most prestigious fashion houses come to Doha, and The Pearl-Qatar as their chosen base for the Middle East, further emphasizing the growing international confidence in the vibrant and diverse economy of the State of Qatar and its leadership.
Having opened a bevy of successful flagship boutiques around the world, the famed Italian shoe-maker Santoni, like many other such world-celebrated fashion icons, chose The Pearl-Qatar to springboard its brand in the region.
Explaining his illustrious firm's strategy for expanding into the Middle East, designer and owner, Giuseppe Santoni, said:
"We believe that Qatar is a very big part of our target market: independent, successful, high-income, self-confident and globetrotting men and women. People who are focused on quality and prestige, attracted by exclusivity and brand image. Every time we decide to open a new boutique. We implement different marketing research to understand where the best location is, and who can be our best partner."
"We are highly selective in the choice of our distribution partners. We believe United Fashion Company is a leader in this market for distribution. We also chose UFC for their top professionalism and their reliability.
"Our decision to open in the Middle East was to give our globetrotting Santoni customers another important place to find their favourite brand - from Doha to Cannes, from Moscow to New York and to Tokyo!"
"For us this is a strategic opening. It helps us to penetrate areas where we are not present and where we very much want to develop our business. We think that in these areas our product and the values are well appreciated. In these areas is concentrated a big part our main target group which appreciates our men's collections, our women's collections, and even our junior collections."
Speaking about the product line in the company's exclusive new boutique in Porto Arabia, Santoni said: "Every boutique or multi-brand Santoni has is a part of the collection which represents the brand, which is Santoni's DNA. In addition there's also a part of the collection customized for the local peculiarities --- such as a certain combination of leather, fabric or colours.
"For example, our male customers ask mainly for sandals and moccasins with top quality leather: smooth and comfortable, hand-painted with beautiful, long lasting colours - but also waterproof.
"Meanwhile," he concluded, "Our women customers are in love with our fashion shoes, and they are proud to show off these "objects d'art" to other women who like exclusive Italian products."
Posted by Rima Ali Al Mashni
