The Entertainer discount voucher books to stop printing in UAE next year

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The Entertainer discount voucher books to stop printing in UAE next year

Dubai - It is one of the oldest and popularly used discount voucher books in the UAE

By Sarwat Nasir

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Published: Mon 23 Oct 2017, 3:36 PM

Last updated: Mon 23 Oct 2017, 5:49 PM

Say goodbye to the book that offered residents thousands of discounts across UAE outlets - The Entertainer will no longer be printing its discount books in 2018.
Instead, the company has decided to go 100 per cent digital, offering residents a more diverse range of discounts through it's mobile application - with offers ranging from fitness, beauty, restaurants, among many others.
Besides The Entertainer, there are other discount voucher mobile apps that have picked up popularity recently, including the VoucherSkout app, which offers discounts across brunches and kids entertainment. Food and beverage delivery apps are also commonly used in the UAE, such as Deliveroo and FoodonClick - all which offer discounted rates at times, depending on the merchant. Groupon and Cobone are also popular among residents in terms of discounted purchases at salons, spas, getaways and services.
The Entertainer, founded 16 years ago, is one of the oldest and popularly used discount voucher books in the UAE, especially among expatriates. So far this year, residents (collectively) have been able to save a total of dh23.7million on brunches, as well as Dh20.8million collective savings on travel using Entertainer vouchers.
"I think it's a perfect time to do it (go fully digital) because you can't just cut off everything," the founder of The Entertainer, Donna Benton, told Khaleej Times.  "I also have to think about all of the people that bought the books in the past few weeks because we have sold hundreds of thousands of them. People used to come up to me years and years ago saying we should go digital, but it just wasn't the right time then.
"I think when we launched digital, it was the perfect time because there's so much planning that goes into it. From our figures over the years, this is the time to go 100 per cent digital because there's a need in the market for it and the books are dying off."
Benton started The Entertainer her first book with an investment of just Dh6,000. However, today, it's turned into an international company with Entertainer available in 13 different countries and contributing $1.3 billion into the global economy.
"For me, obviously, there's different emotions, but as a business going digital, it makes perfect sense for us," Benton said. "I did everything from starting up the company to the legalities, going to the printer, the merchants, because I didn't have any internal graphic designers. I had to go to negotiate with all of the book stores and super markets to get the products in there. It was also a whole new learning experience for me because it was my first year of doing it."


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