The shops in the city centre of Saint-Dizier remained open until midnight on Friday 28 June for the Night of Sales. The event, organised by the Union des marchands bragards, was a great success, even making us forget an afternoon of timid Olympic Flame.
Not sure, when we are traders, that knowing the tide cycle is very useful. Especially in Saint-Dizier, more than 300 kilometers as the crow flies from the nearest sea. However, on Friday June 28, the stores in downtown Bragard experienced a real tidal wave in the evening, after a deep lull in the afternoon.
The result of two combined events: the passage of the Olympic Flame, blocking traffic in the main shopping streets of Saint-Dizier from 2 p.m., then the Night of Sales, from 8 p.m. to midnight. This event, organized by the Union des marchands bragards and which was its third edition, filled the heart of the city with a compact crowd. And therefore, inevitably, the aisles of the shops on rue Gambetta and rue du Docteur-Mougeot.
Complicated afternoon of sales
“We suspected that it was going to be complicated,” lamented, Friday June 28, shortly before 8 p.m., a shopkeeper on rue Gambetta. At this moment, the Bragards who had invaded the sidewalks a few minutes earlier to witness the passage of the Flame had rushed to the Parc du Jard, to admire the burning of the Olympic cauldron in the hands of judoka Axel Clerget. So obviously, the stores open exceptionally were a little left to the side. Same observation from another saleswoman, a few meters further: “The afternoon was really very calm…”
At the seaside, we would have been at the moment when the water retreats far from the coast… just before crashing back into it at full speed. That’s what happened, around 8:30 p.m. All the onlookers gathered at the Jard took possession of the city center, attracted by the entertainment on the Place des Petites-Halles, and surely also by the illuminated sale windows. In the crowd, around 9 p.m., a young woman casually said: “Come on, let’s go for a walk at Pimkie!”
After being worried, the shopkeepers were delighted. On Saturday, June 29, in the morning, they received us with a big smile on their face. “I had so many people, I almost had to throw them out,” smiles the owner of a shop on rue Gambetta. “It was my best Night of Sales, in terms of numbers,” continues one of her colleagues, on rue du Docteur-Mougeot. She concludes: “For it to be even better, even more shopkeepers would have to participate.” A message in a bottle?
Dorian Lacour
