Stationery: New Trends in Education Sector in Lagos State Impact on Sales

Sellers of primary and secondary schools books in Lagos are definitely losing their hitherto huge market, M2 survey of that segment of the market reveals.
Traders who spoke with M2 during the survey identify two major factors affecting sales adversely. One they say is the State government policy of free education which includes free books for school children. This, Mr. Edwin Eze, a stationery dealer at Iyana-Ipaja explains, has cut off that category of customers from the book sellers and according to him, “that was a large chunk of the stationery market.”
The other factor the traders identify is the new trend in most private schools where Proprietors provide their schools’ branded exercise books, graph books and other workbooks to students and subtly compel students to buy and use them. Some of them go as far as having their own book store within the school premises and direct contract with publishers who supply them the text books.
Mr. S.O. Ambra, manager of the popular Ambra Royal Bookshop in Iyana-Ipaja, who acknowledged these challenges, say, however that some private schools can not afford the branded books, “Which means there is still market for us,” he added. On what sales is like currently in view of resumption of schools just few days ahead, the traders admitted that sales are slow now but will pick up the moment schools resume as most parents always postpone the purchase of school materials until resumption.