People in Dubai are loaded with money; do they really care about having cheap coffee and donuts?! Well, apparently YES! Tim Hortons has a huge line up already, packed with home-sick natives. It is a big success; everyone in Dubai is talking about its opening and debating whether it will put Starbucks out of business! Frankly, with Timmies’ cool Iced Capp at such a low price in the hot weather of Dubai, it might do just that!
Timmies is selling at its regular low prices with each timbit costing one Dirham (the Emirate currency) which is about thirty cents, and coffee costing seven Dirhams which is about two dollars. The staff there have also been trained to understand typical orders such as double-double. The menu is identical (except the absence of ‘everything’ bagels) and the donuts and muffins are made fresh every morning. They’ve managed to make it exactly the same, aside from not having drive-through.
There are still 119 more outlets planned for the Middle East over the next five years with the first of those set to open in Abu Dhabi (the capital of UAE which is the country Dubai is in) later this year. And judging from the crowd of about 50 diners and the constant stream of customers threatening to spill out of the front door, the franchise is already poised to be a runaway success.
Following in the University of Waterloo’s footsteps, Tim Hortons sets its ground on the east side of the world. This is not an easy decision to take because unless a citizen in Dubai or the Middle East has been to Canada, he/she wouldn’t know who or what Tim Hortons is. By keeping itself local for so many years, Timmies made a great job at not being popular. Starbucks, Costa and Seattle’s Best Coffee are much more well known. Why would anyone want to try it? For now, the vast majority of customers of Tim Hortons in Dubai are people who have lived in Canada at a point in their lives. Question is whether these will be the only customers Timmies will see in its lifetime in the Middle East or will it grow beyond all the well-known coffee shops and gain greater exposure. Besides its low prices, Timmies does not offer anything more than any other coffee shop.
I saw a comment on the Internet saying that Tim Hortons is “pretty low class”. Is that an insult?! Is Timmies not good enough for Dubai’s modern, shinny look? Living in Dubai as a child, I always had a maid at home who cooked breakfast for me and my siblings every morning. Unlike Canadians who start off their day with Tim Horton’s breakfast combo, most residents of the UAE don’t. So why did it open there?! Were the engineering students of UW in Dubai feeling lonely without their beloved Tim Hortons? Did they need some timbits as they struggled to get their assignments done? For whatever reason someone was brave enough to franchise it there, they did it! And it is indeed a hit (for now…).
Is this great opening of Tim Hortons in Dubai in fact a great opening? Only time will tell. For now, enjoy your great Canadian coffee Dubai-ians!
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