Winter chill wipes up room heater stocks in Gangtok

The weather is warming up in Gangtok now, but before the mercury rose, it dipped substantially, giving Sikkim its coldest winter in many years. Understandably, the rush for room heaters grew. ANUPA RAI reports…

GANGTOK:

The winter has returned with severity this year and mercury has kept exceptionally low since the third week of Jan. Gangtok, which had almost given up on room heaters, with reasonably layered clothing and warm blankets proving enough for the past few years, was forced to invest in these contraptions again. Ever since the snowfall in the higher regions of Gangtok on 17 Jan, the sales of room heaters have spiked. In fact, late comers to shops selling heaters have had to book their warmers in advance with stocks depleting fast.

Shops across town confirmed much higher sale of room heaters this year. Cherry Electronics, among the more popular rendezvous for all things electrical, had stocked up on its winter quota of 50-60 heaters only a couple of days before the snowfall and sold out everything within 48 hours of the mercury plummeting.

And the shops are drawing not just shoppers for room heaters in private homes, on the waiting list for the new stock at Cherry was the Sikkim Tourism Development Corporation with a demand of three pieces of medium sized heaters.

Nearby, at Universal Auto Traders at MG Marg informs that the sale of room heaters have gone up 50-60% this year.

“The shop cleared all the stock during the coldest days experienced last week,” shared the salesperson there. The shop is convinced of fetching more if it brought in a fresh consignment, but there seems to be a problem.

“The demand is much higher than the supply. Consumers want the sturdier and more dependable heaters made by Indian companies, but we can’t seem to be able to source enough of them,” shares a salesperson. Remember, before the chill set in here, North India had already been shivering for a long while.

The silver lining here is that at least in as much as room heaters are concerned, made in India is out-performing the cheaper Chinese maal.

Elsewhere, at Manokamana Enterprises in Daragaon, it’s more of the same. The shopkeeper there informed that this year the weather did not disappoint them and that he could sell out the entire stock or more than 40 pieces within a fortnight.

He is not banking on the weather holding low for much longer as believes that the coldest days are already over. He won’t be bringing in more stock this season.

The temperature has risen noticeable over the past few days, with the sun surfacing for brief moments everyday. The season is however not over yet and another front of ‘western disturbances’ could bring even those who have resisted the temptation of a heated room to line up for room heaters. Through all this, one must credit the Power & Energy Department for having kept the capital alight. Although some areas have reported tripped lines from the load of room heaters, the power supply has been ‘room-warmingly’ consistent…