Customers sort through gold jewellery at Shwe Nan Daw Gold Shop.

IN a corner of Accra, Ghana, tomato stands line a full city block – their produce virtually indistinguishable. Seemingly identical electronics shops abut each other for nearly a mile down Nathan Road in Hong Kong. On Yangon’s Mahabandoola Street, it is gold shops that jockey for position.

One of the mysteries of any economy is how sellers set their goods apart from their competitors’ when those same competitors compose their neighbourhood. Mahabandoola’s most popular gold store, Golden Palace, gives a few clues to solving this mystery.

The store (or stores – it is now a chain of five shops) is run by a husband-and-wife team, Dr Aung Kyaw Win and Dr Thet Thet Khine, who opened their doors shortly after marrying in 1994. Both trained as medical doctors in university and had no business knowledge.

“At that time we had no experience in the gold and jewellery business,” recalls Dr Aung Kyaw Win. “There were a lot of competitors with 40 or 60 years of experience, but we tried very hard and both of us are very ambitious.”

Though karats are not usually staple fare for qualified doctors, the couple entered the business with conviction about how to succeed: develop a fine-tuned marketing strategy. They selected locations from which they could attract the most customers, then lowered prices as much as they could.

“Our quality had to be very good and our prices very competitive,” explains Dr Aung Kyaw Win. “So our profit was a little lower, but we sold the most jewellery.”

Within five years, the Golden Palace’s sales took it to the top of its industry.

Since then, its owners have taken Yangon’s gold business to new heights of efficiency. The foundations of their approach are customer-based: relentless advertising and diligent devotion to customer service.

“Customer service and customer satisfaction are very important, not just in our country but everywhere,” observes Dr Aung Kyaw Win.

Daw Win Myint, an estate broker, shops at the Golden Palace because the discounts and the lucky draws are more frequent than at other stores.

“The quality of gold is good – I can wear it every day and it does not lose its lustre,” she said. “Plus, more than (at) other stores, I can buy and easily sell back (the item).”

The ability to trade back purchases for cash is important to many customers.

From chatting with shoppers, part of the Golden Palace’s popularity hinges on this feature, which Dr Thet Thet Khine refers to as a “liquidity service”.

“We guarantee every product we sell, so that (customers) can trade in their items for the best price of the day,” says Dr Thet Thet Khine. “They can choose a simple design if they want to save money. They can wear (the item) and then if they are short of money they can come and bring it here.”

A shop-worker in Kamayut Township named Daw Lei Lei Win is not a frequent customer – she only visits the shop two or three times a year. But she returns to the Golden Palace because of the ease with which she can return items.

“Money sometimes drifts away. But if we have gold, it’s more stable,” she says.

“And here, it’s very easy to change into money whenever we need to.”

This practice is not unusual – indeed many Chinatown gold shops offer the liquidity service. However, stores can run into trouble when the economic situation spurs a high demand for cash. According to San San Htay, proprietor of Shwe Lee Gold and Jewellery, low sales that typically accompany this trend exacerbate the problem.

Many of Golden Palace’s competitors limit their expenditure on advertising and customer perks to have enough cash to buy back gold on the spot.

“Our shop only focuses on the quality of the gold,” says Khin San Ye, the director of New York Goldsmith and Jewellery. “If customers want to sell back their gold, we can buy it any time because we’re not spending money on lucky draws and the like.”

However, the Golden Palace eschews this conservatism. To boost customer satisfaction, the owners employ a host of strategies, including frequent lucky draws and complimentary gifts for their customers.

Its proprietors also strive to appeal to their customers by keeping their inventory apace with modern design trends from other countries.

“We have changed our inventory to (be) like a foreign country – like Singapore or Bangkok,” says Dr Aung Kyaw Win, who bases designs on those he finds on the internet, featuring new pieces every week or so. “Our shop is fresh (which makes) people very interested,” he says.

The Golden Palace’s modern tack is a consistent theme in their management style. They recently set up an internet server to monitor their inventory and sales – the first of its kind in Myanmar. Dr Thet Thet Khine explains that the online inventory allows employees to register sales with the zap of a laser, giving them more time “taking care” of customers.

“The barcode system is very fast, very accurate, very modern, and can overcome human error,” says Dr Aung Kyaw Win.

“We are very proud of our technology,” adds his wife.