Ahava's closure was no victory for BDS-ers
 | By Joe Millis
March 31, 2011 | Share |
Much as they are going to crow about it, the BDS-ers had very little to do with the closure of the Ahava shop.
Let's look at the evidence calmly. Ahava is a very small outlet selling quite expensive cosmetic goods on one of the most expensive streets in London. It did not have a hinterland. It did not advertise widely. It did not have another shop which could serve as a cash-cow to its loss-leader. Not only that, but it is trading in a very competitive market, against the likes of Lush, Body Shop and other chain stores that tend to sell their wares at much lower prices. And there is a recession and a squeeze on people's pockets. Who can afford to spend more than a tenner on face cream or shower gel? (Real men don't use face cream and a bar of soap costs about a quid.)
It did lose £250,000 last year, despite a £300,000 cash injection from Ahava in Israel. No business can sustain that kind of loss if it isn't willing to back itself with advertising and more shops. Ahava isn't that big a business, even in Israel. In fact, I'm not too sure it has its own shops in Israel, preferring instead to sell through cosmetic shops, small pharmacies and the chain stores, Hamashbir, Superpharm etc.
But if some people are going to blame the BDS demonstrators, all five or six of them who turned up to protest, let's not forget that they probably would have melted away once they got bored. But some people, however well intentioned, didn't think about the publicity they were granting the BDS-ers.
Maybe we can learn from this episode that sometimes the best thing to do is nothing.
COMMENTS
1 April, 2011 - 09:52 Rate this: 0 points | Jon, then why aren't they demonstrating any more outside M&S, which still sells Israeli products? Why not go to Golders Green High Road and demonstrate outside Steimatzky or Yarden? |
1 April, 2011 - 10:12 Rate this: -1 points | Those are far ranging questions Joe and I am not in a position to answer for " them " . Is not the point about Ahava that they have production facilities in the territories and thereby profiting from the illegal occupation ? And the London store may be a financial disaster but that isn't the reason the store is moving location at the time it is moving location. |
1 April, 2011 - 10:14 Rate this: 1 point | JonOtway, the "occupation" is not illegal. And you really think that's why they're demonstrating? These poeople are antisemites, who want Israel to disappear. they have openly stated this. |
1 April, 2011 - 10:15 Rate this: 0 points | So, shall we keep a lookout for a wooly hat in Hatch End? |
1 April, 2011 - 10:17 Rate this: -1 points | No, Jon, the produce is from within Israel, not the occupied territories. All they have in the occupied territories is an office for distribution. |
1 April, 2011 - 10:20 Rate this: -1 points | And, Jon, I'd like to point of that Mitzpeh Shalem is a kibbutz that will go quietly when there's a deal with the Palestinians. They are not God botherers or ideologically motivated when it comes to the occupied territories. |
1 April, 2011 - 10:22 Rate this: 1 point | I see millis, and if it was just Israelis losing jobs, that would be OK? |
1 April, 2011 - 10:22 Rate this: -1 points | Beauty myth?!?!?! Excuse me???? How do you think I got to look like I do? Hi Amber! I've missed you. |
1 April, 2011 - 10:22 Rate this: 1 point | Why do the Jews have to leave when there is a "deal" millis? |
1 April, 2011 - 10:24 Rate this: -1 points | Amber, words cannot describe how obtuse you can be sometimes. |
1 April, 2011 - 11:01 Rate this: 2 points | Ahava was hounded out as a result of bullying by Fascists
|
1 April, 2011 - 11:15 Rate this: -1 points | Ahava was hounded out because the BDS people were given the oxygen of publicity. Had they been left alone, they would have become so bored and their already small numbers dwindled to the point that they would have been shown for the joke that they really are. |
1 April, 2011 - 16:15 Rate this: 0 points | Time to set up camp on home ground. |
1 April, 2011 - 16:48 Rate this: -1 points | Yes, harvey, it would have made a lot more sense to have the shop in golders green like Steimatzky and Yarden |
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JonOtway
1 April, 2011 - 09:00
Rate this:
Unfortunately Joe your analysis doesn't square with the simple known facts.
Ahava have not gone out of business. They have announced an intention to move. The reason for this is that the landlord has indicated that their lease will not be renewed.
And the reason for this is pressure from their other tenants.
And the reason for this is the disruption of their trade by the regular demos and the excrutiatingly embarrassing antics of The Hoff and his EDL mates.
Plenty of businesses are making money from expensive alleged beauty products.
The Ahava demos may have been mostly small but that is in the nature of ongoing campaigns such as the one against Ahava. It is impossible to organise large ongoing weekly demos. The usual strategy is to maintain a presence and have an occasional " big one ". The Ahava campaign was in this tradition. Other examples include EDO and the campaign in Bil'in against the IDF'S defiance of the Israeli Supreme Court.
So the recent development is indeed a victory for the campaign to prevent businesses making money from illegally traded products.
The Covent Garden trader who said that Ahava will be followed wherever they go in London is surely right.
The game is almost up.