With the spread of the coronavirus, and in line with the changes that the pandemic brought to the retail market, the Red Sea Mall worked to boost digital solutions and technologies to ensure a safe, easy, and practical shopping experience for its visitors.
Red Sea Mall has made it mandatory for stores to provide smart payment methods for the safety of employees and visitors.
RSM General Manager Engineer Al Rayan Gadouri said: “The Covid-19 pandemic has changed shopping behaviors and some economic concepts. It encouraged investments in digital solutions and imposed changes on many sectors, particularly retail. We in Red Sea Mall keep up with modern and smart technologies and make them available to our customers out of commitment to the Kingdom’s 2030 vision and the Saudi leadership’s efforts to create a prosperous national economy. We encourage our visitors to use e-payments while shopping in the mall. These solutions are easy, fast, safe, and they help protect them from infection that might be transmitted through contaminated banknotes.”
For his part, RSM Head of Marketing Abdul Raouf Al Hafiz commented: “Saudi Arabia has a robust national e-payment infrastructure. The Saudi payment network Mada saw a large growth during the partial and full lockdown periods that were imposed during the pandemic, with online purchases increasing to 20.8 million in the first quarter of 2020 and purchases via points of sale (POS) devices increasing to 543 million during the same period. This is an increase of 67% in POS purchases compared to the same period last year. Transactions through Near-Field Communication (NFC) technology comprised 79% of all POS purchases in the first quarter, an increase of about 263% compared to the same period last year. With these figures in mind, the RSM encourages shoppers to use e-payment systems to protect themselves and contribute to the achievement of the Kingdom’s 2030 vision.”
RSM shops and outlets cooperate with Mada to enable shoppers and visitors to pay electronically and use their credit cards and Apple Pay. This is part of the mall’s strategy to encourage customers to use digital solutions to remain safe during their shopping and limit the spread of the virus through direct personal contact and the exchange of cash.
