The mechanics of retail with Baraka’s Ahmed Ragab

Ahmed Ragab: Not everything has to be tech based. Not everything has to be driven by VC. We don’t have to introduce technology to whatever we do, if it’s not a part of the game.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’re not going to be disrupted by a website or by AI? 

Ahmed Ragab: You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. I remember during Covid, everyone was saying the total shift is going online. When they talked to me about it — in Egypt or the Middle East, 2% of the trade compared to 98% offline — and told me this is the future: when it comes, I’ll join. But for now I’m focusing on the 98%.

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Patrick FitzPatrick: Hey everyone.

Today on Making It, I’m talking to Ahmed Ragab, the chairman of Baraka Optics.

Ragab grew up in his family’s business — he started at Baraka as an intern after telling his dad he wanted to earn his place, not just inherit it. 

Over the next 25 years, he turned an eyeglasses business into something much bigger: Global brand partnerships. Retail chains and e-commerce. Limited-edition drops. A partnership with one of the region’s best-known influencers.

Then, this May, Ragab sold control of Baraka to Maghrabi, the cross-town rival that his company had been fighting for the better part of 40 years. 

Maghrabi is the biggest eyewear retailer in the Middle East, and it bought 51% of Baraka Optics. Ragab steps out of the CEO’s chair, but he’s staying on as chairman for the first two years.

On paper, it’s a tidy story. A big company buys smaller rival. Scale wins and another Egyptian family business gets swallowed.

Except that’s not what happened.

Ragab could have sold the whole thing and walked away richer than he already was. 

But he didn’t. He kept 49% — and he built in options that do something pretty cool over the next four years: If Magrabi lists on a stock exchange, Ragab’s stake in the Egyptian business converts up into the regional parent in Dubai. 

So Ragab hasn’t really cashed out of optics — he’s swapped a piece of an Egyptian eyeglasses chain for pre-IPO exposure to a seven-country group on its way to the public markets. 

Look at it that way, and he didn’t sell the family business so much as he traded up.

What makes me most excited to have Ragab on the show is that he’s is an honest-to-God retailer. He buys things and sells those things to people. 

Rinse and repeat. 

We talk a lot here at Enterprise about manufacturing and exports and startups and banking and financial services — but Egypt’s economy is a consumer economy.

And it's a story I don’t think we spend enough time on. 

So, yeah, we’re going to talk about how Ragab decided to give his biggest rival the keys to the company that his dad built. I want the story on how he got everyone — Maghrabi, his family, and his own ego — to all sign the same piece of paper. 

I mean, who called whom? When? What was the motivation?

But what I really want to do is go deep into the psychology and the business of what has kept our economy afloat for the past 15 years — the Egyptian consumer. 

And that’s the conversation.

Ragab, welcome to Making It.

Ahmed Ragab: Thank you. Bgad, my sincere pleasure.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Your family spent 50 years going head to head with Magrabi. 

Ahmed Ragab: Yes. 

Patrick FitzPatrick:  And then you sold them control of the company.

I think I’d like to start with a simple question. Who called who first? Who texted who first?

Ahmed Ragab: It’s a merger through acquisition. And let me answer three clear questions. Why did it happen? Why didn’t it happen before? And how will this impact the market?

Okay, so if we see the market for the past 15 years, we’ll find two main key characters that identify the Egyptian market. 

First thing: the Egyptian currency lost 90% of its value. So if we talk about 2014, the USD was traded for five EGP. Now it’s 50. So it’s a clear 90%.

Second fact is that every two or three years you will have a hiccup that will reset the market. Whatever the hiccup.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Covid, devaluation, something.

Ahmed Ragab: It became a very tough market, and the competition became very tough.

Putting this aside — when we talk about the optical industry, the global market is controlled by one company, Luxottica, which controls 90% market share. And it has presence in the manufacturing, retail, lenses business, all the parts of the supply chain.

So it’s clearly identified that the way forward is creating more strength, rather than creating something different. So this always made perfect sense.

But why did it not happen? 

First thing is the ego. Second thing is the mistrust. The very, very, very thin line between competition and cooperation. If you’re able to crack it, it will take the game to a totally different direction.

So I started shifting the conversation from 2023. Look, man, we have been competing for the past 50 years, 40 years. It means if I win, you lose. If you win, I lose. So let’s start with making it easier for us to communicate. Let’s always remember that we’re not in a competition to prove who is better.

Patrick FitzPatrick: We’re both pretty good.

Ahmed Ragab: I had my wins. You had your wins. It’s not a game to prove who is better.

Saying this, we started developing the relation, opening things together.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So this happens over dinner.

Ahmed Ragab: Over a series of dinners.

Patrick FitzPatrick: A series of dinners. You and who? Who are you talking [to]?

Ahmed Ragab: Me and the CEO of Maghrabi. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: In this dinner we’ll discuss everything. And people started — when people from the industry are sitting together, why are they sitting together? They should avoid each other. Why? Why?

At the end of the day, it’s a very simple game. So we sort of have this conversation, until one day it clicked. You know what? We have to take this friendship, this cooperation, to the other level. Let’s do that.

The first meeting was in Dubai on the 13th of May, 2025.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You remember the day.

Ahmed Ragab: La la I’m very good with the days. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Wow.

Ahmed Ragab: And it was a secret date between me and the CEO and the investor relations.

Let’s have valuations of both companies, and then we’ll decide together what’s the best form of partnership that we want to do. And then it took us three months to decide that it will be a merger through acquisition. Maghrabi will acquire 51% of the shares, and then it will be under Magrabi’s operation for the coming period. Baraka Optics Group will retain its board seats, a strategic role.

And then we signed the MoUs on the 8th of September 2025. Then we started the due diligence process, which took a good six months. And then we signed the deal and announced on the 15th of May, 2026, in Dubai. And we announced it on the 18th of May, waiting for regulatory approvals, of course.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And those are purely in Egypt. Yeah. Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: So how will this impact the market? I think this will offer the market a scale of eyewear operation that will be able to serve the customer through better locations, more locations, more brands, more presence, more services, better pricing.

And if we talk roughly about the formal eyewear industry, we estimate that we control collectively now 50%. With this merger, we estimate that for the first year we can reach easily 70%, and then we can reach a good 80, 90% within the coming three to five years.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Are you a little bit worried that the Competition Authority listens to this and says, hey—

Ahmed Ragab: I’m talking about the formal market.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How much is formal versus how much—

Ahmed Ragab: It’s equal, if not less than, the informal market.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So, like the general economy.

Ahmed Ragab: The Egyptian market is extremely big, structured on different layers. So no one can have it all. It’s too big to swallow by yourself.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How are you guys different from each other? What’s the difference between Baraka and Magrabi, from a consumer experience? 

What makes me decide I’m going to go to that nice burgundy of yours versus the blue of the other guy?

Ahmed Ragab: I give them the credit that they are more systematic, more organized. But we have always been rooted in extreme customer service.

And going back to the scale thing — what will the scale offer to the shareholders? In all family businesses, no one thinks about the coming step. We always say nice words like corporate governance and boards and so on, but we are never serious about it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You don’t think people are serious about institutionalization?

Ahmed Ragab: No.

So I believe this scale will give us options. These options may include an IPO, or entering into a major strategic deal again.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: If you need to have options, you need to have scale. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Agreed. A 100%. 

Ahmed Ragab: So now, the first step: we’ll have the scale that will give us the options to decide what is the coming step.

But this will enforce us. We really have full isolation between ownership and management. 

Including myself — I won’t have so much involvement in the business, and I cannot control the business according to my preferences. And I always try to do this. For the past five years, I even had an outside board of experience for that. And the first thing I told the board is that I want you to make me uncomfortable.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How did you choose your board?

Ahmed Ragab: It was after my father passed away in 2021. I decided to have people on board that will protect me from taking the company in the direction that I want. I want to put barriers for myself.

So I started: what areas do I need? I started with human resources, finance and investment, and marketing and communication.

And honestly, we had the journey together for three or four years — it was from May 2022 till September 2024. You have to stop this and this and this. You close this and this and this. You’re wrong in this and this and this.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Interesting.

Ahmed Ragab: I kept fighting back, back and forth. And then I followed the directions, and it became one of the best things that happened to the company.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Why did you wind down the board?

Ahmed Ragab: Because we started this negotiation with the board. So I believe now we’re preparing for another phase in our journey. Now we need different dynamics.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: So this scale will give us options to implement corporate governance for the coming generations.

I always tell my sister, who’s my partner, that I want to give options to our kids to do whatever they want, regardless of their ownership. We were very lucky as kids that our dad created a big business enterprise in retail, and we were lucky to join. But we had no option to join if we wanted to work in our own business.

I want to give my kids the—

Patrick FitzPatrick: Optionality.

Ahmed Ragab: To choose, regardless of what they own.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You had the option of selling 100%? Yes. And walking away. You gave up control and you get 49%. That’s a lot of risk left on the table, man.

Ahmed Ragab: But a lot of opportunities left on the table. I believe in the story.

It’s very clear from day one regarding this merger that we’re looking for the upside. If I just wanted to cash out and create the value, I would have done it. I had the option.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And would it have taken three years to build trust and friendship?

Ahmed Ragab: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: None of us have a crystal ball, but IPO markets in the Middle East are really fickle beasts, right? 

We were all convinced we’d be doing a Banque Du Caire IPO right now. Does that make you nervous at all? Does it keep you on edge?

Ahmed Ragab: Not at all. Because from day one, we did this merger planning to reach a scale that will give us the options and the luxury of choice.

If IPO is a good option, I’ll do it. If not, we’re very good the way that we’re operating, and we have the scale that we can still grow and operate with our current structure.

We’re open to all paths, all options. And we created this merger, this structure, to give us the luxury of choice, and the control in what we want to do and what we don’t want to do.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So it’s two years down the road. You have a strategic on the table, or you’re sitting across from investment bankers who are advising you on going public. 

What is the transaction, and what assets are part of that?

Ahmed Ragab: I think we have all the options on the table. We can go with the Egyptian company, or the Egyptian structure, which includes the Baraka–Magrabi company.

I think there are other options on the regional level. But if anything is going to happen on the regional level by that time, or any option, this will include the share swap from the Egyptian company to the regional. 

But I’m not confirming or denying that anything is happening on the regional level.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I’m curious. We’ve got Eyewa from Saudi, which made a lot of noise about raising USD 100 million back in 2024, I think it was. They talk an interesting game.

Can they compete with you guys? What does a startup online player know that you guys don’t? And what do you know that they don’t know?

Ahmed Ragab: I believe when it comes to the eyewear industry, it’s a classic, boring industry. 

It’s based on very simple formulas: that if you deliver — you serve the customer.

Not everything has to be tech based. Not everything has to be driven by VC. Some businesses and some industries are there to be operated in a simple way. We sell more pieces to more people, creating more profits, more frequently. 

We don’t have to introduce technology to whatever we do, if it’s not a part of the game.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’re not going to be disrupted by a website or by AI?

Ahmed Ragab: You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. And by the way, we introduced the concept of digital fitting in 2016.

It was called Fitting Box — you can, through the iPad, fit the frames and everything. And customers said, “you know what, I prefer to try it on myself.”

Some industries are there to be done in the boring way, and we don’t have to complicate things. So when you ask me about this, I’m not worried about it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You started as an intern in the business. And I was listening to another interview that you did, where you said you didn’t want to inherit it. You wanted to earn it.

Ahmed Ragab: Yeah. I always had this challenge that I need to get that validation.

When I was 19, I was in the university. I decided with a group of friends, I want to open a fashion store. As simple as that. No plan, nothing. There was a very famous street in Heliopolis for fashion by that time, called Horreya Street. It’s easy — we’ll just do a cool design and we’re just going. Of course, it was a mess.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It’s not easy.

Ahmed Ragab: So I went with my dad. I need your help — just when I select the location, just to do the deal. Okay. Went on and on and on. Of course, at the end, we didn’t do the deal.

Dad told me, you know what you want to do? Retail and fashion. Why don’t you learn it? One of the companies that we invest in, we don’t run, was the Nike operation in Egypt. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. 

Ahmed Ragab: I call my partners and my friends: you join as an intern after you finish your university, just learn, if you want to open your own business. I told him okay. 

I joined on the 10th of June, 2002, just after my finals. And since that day, I never stopped working.

I spent one and a half years in the Nike operation in Egypt. I learned about everything firsthand. Warehousing. Sales. Purchasing. Analysis. Local production. Retail planning. Retail construction. Visual merchandizing. I spent like three or four weeks in every department, doing things firsthand.

After three months, I told my dad, you know what? It’s not as easy as it seemed before.

And then 2003 — it was very significant for them that Maghrabi was attracting the younger customers.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: So, you know what? We’re launching a new brand for eyewear targeting the youngsters. Why don’t you come and join us?

Patrick FitzPatrick: What was the name of the brand?

Ahmed Ragab: C&Co.

We launched on the 27th of December 2003, and I gave it my all.

I remember 2004, we opened one store every month. It was very aggressive. I remember at that time, in February 2004, we opened the store in Mohandeseen, in Lebanon Street. It was very significant to have a coffee bar inside the store, and this was something very new to the optical market.

It was by the direction that I’m representing C&Co. and my dad is representing Baraka. So I have to prove myself that I earned my position — I just didn’t have it, or inherit it.

So I kept on trying and trying, until I put the goal that one day the turnover shall exceed Baraka. It was very childish, that I took the challenge that I want to beat my own company. But I wanted to prove [myself].

Patrick FitzPatrick: Did you tell your dad what your goal was?

Ahmed Ragab: Yes. 2008, we did it. And at that point we decided to merge both operations together. I reached the goal. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Wow.

Ahmed Ragab: Fast forward to 2010. Luxottica, the biggest distributor in the world, decided to go into a drag race between us and Magrabi: who will take the lead and distribute to the Egyptian market?

On the 27th of May 2010, the Luxottica directors came to Egypt and met with us for one hour, and they said clearly: we decided to go with Magrabi. Although you have the bigger experience, they have the bigger scale regarding their regional presence.

I took it very personally. 

So I went to the smaller brand, which was by that time called Police. It was a very big brand in the ’80s and the ’90s, but by that time it was not as big as Ray-Ban.

And I called them in Italy. I told them, you know what? Let us have a plan to override Ray-Ban in the region in the coming five years.

First, let’s start with the celebrity endorsement that is only tailored for the region. We did the market study, and we found that the only celebrities that are relevant for the whole region, from Morocco to Iran, are Amr Diab and Tamer Hosny. 

And we decided to settle with Tamer Hosny, because he was the one rising by that time.

Then I traveled to Belluno, which is a small city in Italy. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: What is the new trend that you want to introduce to the market? Let’s do something in the lenses called blue mirrored lenses. And this will be the new trend that everyone will be talking about.

I went back to the Egyptian market. I invited all the opticians and all the big players in the market.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Took them on a sales junket. 

Ahmed Ragab: Yes. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Nice.

Ahmed Ragab: I remember by that time we used to distribute around 5,000 pieces of Police in the market, versus 10 to 15,000 pieces of Ray-Ban in the market. 

In July 2010, we reached orders of 35,000 pieces of Police. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Oppa. 

Ahmed Ragab: It was booming.

I went back to the market and I rented all the windows of all the opticians all over Egypt. It’s like a moving billboard — whenever you walk in the street, you’ll just find one picture: Tamer Hosny and the blue lenses.

And then we went to Dubai, to the Atlantis, to announce the new era of eyewear with the blue mirror lenses and Tamer Hosny overtaking the whole region. 

Boomed. 

Things are going perfectly. I started receiving the stocks. They started shipping in January 2011.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: We invested a big chunk of money. To us, by that time, it was 5 million USD.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That’s a lot of money at the time. It’s a lot of money today, but it’s a lot of money then.

Ahmed Ragab: And then 25th of January, everything stopped.

There was something by that time called the whitelist and the blacklist. Tamer Hosny was on the wrong side at that time — which was on the blacklist, because he was supporting Mubarak. 

All the campaign that we installed in December got burnt out.

I remember an optician calling me at midnight from Suez: please come remove whatever you have on my shop. People are throwing Molotov bottles on my shop, because they want to bring his picture down.

So it all went to scratch. 

Moving forward, we started the devaluation. Then it started to have two prices for the USD by that time. And this is the killer in this business, because you sell on credit and you pay in advance.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And you’re paying in advance. So you’ve got a mismatch right away.

Ahmed Ragab: We started having regional shopping malls by that time — Mall of Arabia, Mall of Egypt. The retail map’s changing.

So I looked at them, our main competition, Magrabi: either we compete with them through going to the region and being head to head with him, or through changing the scene in Egypt and controlling it from a different direction.

So why don’t we move from being an optical retailer into a retail operator?

Patrick FitzPatrick: What’s the difference?

Ahmed Ragab: When you’re a retail operator, you have different heads, different identities. Your overheads are less. If I enter one shopping mall and I rent one store, I pay 10 pounds. If I rent more space, I take it for 5 pounds. So I have a better competitive advantage, better operating expenses.

So I visited the GCC market with two options on the table: either we open there, or we bring someone here. I went all over, explored the market, met everyone and decided — until, on the 15th of November 2012, we met with Apparel Group, which was one of the biggest retail operators in the GCC and based in Dubai. 

Told us, you know what? Let’s start having a joint venture. I bring your brands to the GCC, and you take my brands to Egypt.

We started negotiating from November 2012 till we signed on the 9th of February 2016. Four years.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That’s a long time.

Ahmed Ragab: A lot of things were happening in the market at that time.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It was a messy time for all of us.

Ahmed Ragab: So from 2017 to 2020, we opened more than 50 stores, different brands. We opened Makeup, we opened New Balance, we opened Beverly Hills Polo Club. 

And then we ventured into other things.

We started partnering with a local designer to create the first local brand in the market, which was Tiyi — T-I-Y-I. We created a partnership with Cilantro to operate 50% of their operations in shopping malls.

So we expanded aggressively from 2017 to 2020. Many turned out to be a great success. Part of them was a failure. So after that the board stepped in, and we started by evaluating every chunk of the business, taking decisions.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay.

Ahmed Ragab: From that time, we shifted from being Baraka Optics Group, the optical retailer, to Baraka Group, the retail operator. 

So this created the balance between us and the competition. Maybe they’re the original, but in Egypt we were more diversified than [them].

Patrick FitzPatrick: Interesting, man.

Ahmed Ragab: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: We’re going to take a break. And when we come back, we are going to talk about a topic that Making It does not spend enough time on: retail, and the psychology of the Egyptian consumer.

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Patrick FitzPatrick: I want to talk to you, man, about something that I don’t think we talk about enough on the show, or in Enterprise itself. And that’s retail — which is kind of shameful, because the economy is driven by consumption.

What has changed in the retail industry in the last 10 or 15 years that people outside retail don’t understand?

Ahmed Ragab: The retail industry, by definition, is one of the most dynamic industries globally. When I say dynamic, I mean that it changes every three to five years. What was relevant five years ago is not relevant now. And the way things were sold five years ago is not relevant now.

So when you talk about retail in Egypt, we’re talking about different levels. First thing: how the retail is offered, who’s offering it, and who’s buying it.

So to put a clear definition of retail: it is the business of selling pieces to people, more frequently. That’s it. And we make money out of that.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That’s the job.

Ahmed Ragab: Till 2000, 2010 it was mainly street locations. Egypt was mainly an urban city, so in order to open a chain, you have to be present in every neighborhood.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So I’m in Mohandeseen, and I’m in—

Ahmed Ragab: Mohandseen. Zamalek. Maadi… 

Fast forward from 2010 till 2020, and there started the concept of mega malls. This was mainly driven by Gulf investors bringing the investments to Egypt, and it became a big thing to have the huge shopping malls. So now this is the new dynamic of the thing.

By that time, also from 2010 to 2020, people became less dependent on city centers. But still these cities are built on highways, so the concept of having a walk and so on is not there.

By that time evolved the concept of what we call the community malls. What is the community mall? Something like Arkan, like 5A, like Galleria 40. 

If you see Arkan, for example, it is the new Zamalek. My office is upstairs, I’m having coffee down, I’m eating this for lunch, and then I’m buying something at the grocery on my way back home. I create this close neighborhood, or fake neighborhood that you start operating like this.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It’s a little bit more vertical, not quite as horizontal.

Ahmed Ragab: Yeah, this is how it evolved in this area. That’s why people enjoy spending time in these areas. It’s like the good old days.

Second thing is, what is the retail offering in the market? So if you take, for example, the eyewear industry: before 1984, it was only a stock business that was based on selling the lenses or whatever. It was more like an industry, not a retail business. You go there because you need to repair your eyewear or something.

My dad was not an optician, knew nothing about optics, but he sensed the gap that people lacked fashion eyewear. So he introduced the concept in the ’70s and ’80s — there’s something called fashion sunglasses and so on — and it boomed. So the way sunglasses were offered changed, from being just a service provider into a fashion operator.

Moving forward, with the competition and so on, the variety became more. So we started developing the concept of private labels. I can create a brand from my own creative and old story and sell it to you.

Then let’s talk about the sports industry. It started with multi-brand offerings, clustered ones with brands from here and there, in the ’80s and the ’90s. Then in the late ’90s started the concept of the first mono brand, Nike and so on.

Now, when I tell you sports, probably you mention one of two brands: Alo Yoga and Lululemon. These are the two winners right now.

So we have always to keep evolving. We put a cycle of three to five years, that we have to revisit and shift the concept and the way that we sell what we’re selling and how we’re selling it. 

For example, when we operate New Balance — we started in June 2018, and now we’re having a full revamp with a full interactive experience on the way. Maybe we’re selling the same products at the end of the day, but how it’s sold, and what is the mood that I want to give you inside the store — it’s a totally different story.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How do you stay up on the trends?

Ahmed Ragab: You have always to study a lot, to read a lot, to explore a lot, to see a lot, to travel, touch, feel.

By the way, let me tell you something about how I discovered Karen Wazen. 2017. I was having dinner with my wife and little daughter in Dubai, in one of my favorite restaurants there. And then: oh, look who’s here. Who’s here? 

Karen Wazen. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Who the hell is Karen Wazen?

Ahmed Ragab: Hold on. She went, she asked for a photo. For me, this was very strange, because my wife, for example, she has only five posts on Instagram. She went, she was very happy, she posted the picture.

Everyone: oh, how lucky you are. Who is this? I don’t know her. 2017.

Fast forward two or three years. I go frequently to Dubai, because we moved our operations, logistics hub and financial hub to Dubai. Every time I go — she introduced her eyewear brand — I come back with people ordering her eyewear. Just bring it for me.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Bring it for me.

Ahmed Ragab: I go back to my hotel room, I find ten—

Patrick FitzPatrick: Boxes waiting.

Ahmed Ragab: For me. And I work in the eyewear business. And what is this?

We met in September 2020. My daughter: please, can you take a picture with her and send me a video? Okay, Karen, I don’t know what you do, but obviously you’re doing something right.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Something right.

Ahmed Ragab: So, okay, I just want to order some pieces for my optical shops.

Something was different with this. It proves everything that we’ve been talking about wrong. Family business is going to die if it’s not corporate — it is a purely and proudly family business. 

Karen is the founder, with her husband and brother-in-law, they are the ones running the show. Purely family. Her mother is the designer of all the concepts. It is a family business that is proving success and competing with everyone else.

For the first time ever, I find demand exceeding the supply that we’re offering in the eyewear business. So we created this big event, and for the first time I see a two-kilometer queue to enter the store to buy a piece.

If you think about it, I told her: you’re selling the same pieces, and nothing special about eyewear. Cool design, so on, normal pricing. But I believe people are buying your story. People are loving the brand and loving the story. That’s why people are stepping in.

These days, for example, I always sit with my daughter and friends. Who do you prefer? What brands? What is the new trend?

For example, there was a trend for the past three years of  what they’re calling “looking drippy.” I don’t know what “drippy” is. And when I say everyone drippy, he just does this with his body. What is this drippy thing? And what does this mean?

Patrick FitzPatrick: Two old guys wondering about life. Yeah.

Ahmed Ragab: Now there’s a new expression. Quiet luxury.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Quiet luxury.

Ahmed Ragab: Even now, the big brands are going “low-key”, “old money”. Our industry now is all about quiet luxury. No logos, very simple frames, very small frames. 

Before that, it was logo mania.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Interesting.

Ahmed Ragab: So this is a very dynamic industry, where you always have to be relevant.

Online and offline — we had this debate of online, offline. I remember during Covid everyone was saying the total shift is going online.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You didn’t see it.

Ahmed Ragab: I didn’t see it. I don’t see it coming.

When they talked to me about it — in Egypt or the Middle East, 2% of the trade compared to 98% offline — and told me this is the future: when it comes, I’ll join. But for now I’m focusing on the 98%, where the money is. 

In the US, which is the biggest market, it’s 75% offline, 25% online. For me, I focused on the 75%.

I’d rather be late to the party than being at the wrong party. I learned that the hard way.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Eyewear kind of sits in this weird position, adjacent to fashion retail and to health care. And I can imagine that that puts a bit of a floor under the industry. I mean, I need glasses. There’s no option to not wear glasses, no option to not wear contacts.

But at the same time, we’ve just passed through an age of hyperinflation. How does consumer purchasing power feel to you today?

Ahmed Ragab: When it comes to the eyewear industry, there’s always the purchasing part, given the health care part that you mentioned. It’s just how the people consume, and how it changes. 

Before that when you have a beautiful economy, a rising economy, they spend more on changing fashions rather than the health care part.

And that’s why — going back to the merger that we had with Magrabi — to give us the scale that will enable us to offer to the market all solutions to all problems and to all... We’ll have the entry-level eyewear, the extreme high-end fashion eyewear, the full range of technical and lenses part. 

So it will be a multi-diversified business that will be able to grab the customer from whatever angle he thinks about.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What’s the biggest margin for you guys as a business? Where do you make your money? Is it on the frames? Is it the lenses?

Ahmed Ragab: The lenses. The biggest margin comes from the lenses part.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. What does your sales data tell you over the past four or five years about how squeezed Egyptian consumers were?

Ahmed Ragab: Look, if you are big enough in the retail market, you never feel the squeeze. Because there are two ways to grow your market share: either you grow through the growth of everyone, or you grow through the fall of someone else and you get his market share.

If you’re big enough and have the structure and the resilience to absorb different hits, I think every time a reshuffle happens, a new part of the market will be free. Even if the market size is getting smaller, your size is getting bigger in the market.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Because you’re able to go after more share.

Ahmed Ragab: Yeah. Or the market is getting bigger, like what happened in Dubai for the past three years, so everyone is rising together. 

Now in Dubai… in the way now, it’s going down. So some people are falling and some people are collapsing, and some people are just sustaining by getting the parts of the falling businesses.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Are you seeing more and more sales on credit? Or is value becoming more and more a part of your mix?

Ahmed Ragab: 100%. It is a very significant part of the business, especially in the past year. And I believe that people are using these credit options just to retain their position in the market, to afford, or to keep the affordability option with less pressure.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Yeah. And the big knock on consumer finance as a product is: if you’re smoothing out cash flows, that’s one thing. If you’re financing affordability, the market runs into trouble.

Ahmed Ragab: Definitely. I was analyzing this yesterday. It’s now accumulating around 35% to 40% of our turnover.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Wow. How much was it five years ago?

Ahmed Ragab: 10 to 15 two years ago. Before that it was less.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Yeah. Do you see that changing? Is wage catch-up happening? Do you have any sense of how the market is moving?

Ahmed Ragab: I believe with every inflation, it takes at least five years to catch up with that.

But the good thing and the bad thing about the Egyptian market is that it’s a huge market. Whenever you dip your spoon, you find some customers coming out.

In one of the talks in Dubai [someone told me] how do you see the difference between the Dubai economy and the Egyptian economy? 

Dubai’s like the Crème Brûlée. It is very shiny and lusty. But when you dip the spoon, you hit the plate.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You hit the bottom really fast.

Ahmed Ragab: It’s empty from inside. The crust is very shiny.

The Egyptian economy, it’s like Umm Ali. It’s many ingredients. No one knows the recipe. But I promise you something: whenever you dip the spoon, you will find something coming out of the spoon. It is a pure Egyptian thing. Whenever you dip the spoon, you’ll find the consumer. 

Egypt is like different layers, different markets, all living together.

Patrick FitzPatrick: All right. Before we go on a break, one more question. What do you measure in the retail side of your business that nobody else does, and that gives you an edge?

Ahmed Ragab: The customer retention rate.

And we have something that we build our strategy around for the employees: get them doing something right. Just do anything right, and you’ll be extremely and generously awarded for that.

For example, if a customer writes a thank-you letter, or he expresses one way or another that he is happy with the service.

The customer is happy, the employee is happy, and he’s doing the extra mile to serve him. And this gives you the edge and the retainability to be able to absorb anything coming, and to have a very solid ground to build upon.

Patrick FitzPatrick: When we come back, we’re going to discuss what’s next, post this transaction.

———

Patrick FitzPatrick: Ragab I want to know: what are you building now? You’ve got this longer-term, let’s say medium-term, bet on the future of Baraka Optics. 

But what is the business that you are building now?

Ahmed Ragab: If I go back to the heritage and the legacy that my father built from the ’70s, it’s based on — I don’t want to say the courage, but I want to say the exploration.

Patrick FitzPatrick: To be an entrepreneur.

Ahmed Ragab: Yes. 

I can guarantee that every time we’ll be doing two things: introducing and creating a brand, and growing an existing one. The time frame and the scale of the brands depends on the market map and market dynamics.

For the time being, we’re introducing Karen Wazen, and we’re betting big time on it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What’s big time? Define that.

Ahmed Ragab: Opening ten stores in three years. And we’re having a big launch in September.

And we have two running brands that we’re growing. We have New Balance, that we’re targeting to grow this year almost more than 150%

Patrick FitzPatrick: How? 

Ahmed Ragab: More offerings, faster delivery. So I believe this is a golden opportunity to have this market share, given the disruptions to other brands in the market.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What are the disruptions to the other brands in the market?

Ahmed Ragab: There are disruptions coming from the supply chain, from the change of the partnerships and so on. So it’s for us a chance to grab this.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Go for market share.

Ahmed Ragab: We have also Beverly Hills Polo Club, which is a partnership with Apparel Group. And it is depending on local manufacturing and imported goods. Now we’re increasing the part of local manufacturing.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What are you making here?

Ahmed Ragab: We’re making all kinds of apparel. Denim, shirts, jackets, everything.

Patrick FitzPatrick: For local, or for local and export?

Ahmed Ragab: For local, for the time being. And I have to be very clear with myself: I am a retailer. I’m not a manufacturer. I believe sometimes it’s something that, oh, I can manufacture. No. I’m a retailer.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How do you resist the temptation? So many people get pulled down that road, right?

Ahmed Ragab: Through many mistakes I did before. I got the temptation, and I got brought down. 

So with this gray hair, now I know what can work and what cannot work.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Yeah. Retail is super high stress. Yes. Why the hell are you still doing it? Where does the fire come inside you to make you want to do that?

Ahmed Ragab: Maybe I just want to have a story. Maybe I just want to leave my kids a legacy.

Sometimes you have the affordability, and you have the luxury, to create something that you’re passionate about, and create something from scratch. So it always changes. And I tend, every two to three years, to reflect and to revive myself.

Maybe at this time I have the luxury just to step out of the business day to day, and to think and reflect. You always have to be a developing person. I think this is the target that I put to myself: we always have to be relevant in the era and the period you’re operating in, and to reach its maximum.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’ve mentioned kids a couple of times now, and like we discussed earlier, you came up in the family business as a kid wanting to prove yourself. 

One of the things that I discuss with founders all the time is that tension between wanting to give my kid optionality and really hoping the kid follows me into the business.

You followed your dad into the business?

Ahmed Ragab: Yes. 

And I was very lucky, because he gave me my space from day one — including the space to make mistakes that he knew were mistakes. I’ll just manage the mess, but this will take you somewhere else.

He supported my decisions. Some decisions were proven right and some were proven wrong. He gave me the optionality to make mistakes, and the luxury to make mistakes. So I was very lucky with my father.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What did he do? Or was it something in you that said, yeah, I can go into the family business?

Ahmed Ragab: I think he gave me my own space to prove myself. And when I created my own story, he said, now, okay, we can join stories. You’re not just a kid who inherited the business. You’re a kid who had his story, and now can join the family business.

And I tell you, after all this time, I believe the biggest asset that I had in my life was my father. He was the reason for anything good that I am today.

So I want to give the same optionality to my kids. Maybe by the time they grow up, they want to do business the way I’m doing. Maybe they want to do business a different way.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You want to stay there and continue to enjoy the legacy of what dad built. There’s a governance structure in place that ensures there’s a management team that’s willing—

Ahmed Ragab: If you want to sell your shares through a public offering, whatever. It’s an option. If you want to keep it, it’s an option. If you want to have your own thing, I have your back.

Maybe they’re still young, I don’t know. My daughter is 15, my boy is five. So I still have some years to develop this. 

But I want to make sure that I’m always developing options and structure and base for them to do whatever they want.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What would you tell a friend who has a 25-year-old kid, he really wants that kid to come into the family business, and the kid is not interested? What do you tell him?

Ahmed Ragab: I tell him my story. This is what I did. This is what my dad did. This is what I’m 100% sure of. If this suits you, I can help. If this doesn’t suit you, you’ll have my opinion.

 But it’s not the right — everyone has the right thing. It’s relevant from one person to another, to the circumstance, to the business, to whatever it is.

People give the feeling that there’s only one way of being successful, through following this model. No. Success is very relative.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How do you define success?

Ahmed Ragab: For me, success is what they call rahet el bal [peace of mind]. To be able to be very proud of yourself, from inside, and in front of your family and kids.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What is something that you believed early in your career that you’ve really changed tack on, or really changed your mind about?

Ahmed Ragab: I think two things, honestly, that I developed over time.

First thing is not to take anything personally. Isolate what I feel from what I do.

Second thing that I learned is that I have sometimes to step up and take the responsibility. Maybe being younger — the main thing, it’s not me, it’s not me, it’s not me. Sometimes it takes courage and experience [to say]: you know what, it is me. And we’ll do it this way.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I come to you tomorrow and I say, here you go, you can do anything in life, but you can’t be a retailer anymore. What are you going to do?

Ahmed Ragab: I’m going to own and operate a soccer club.

Patrick FitzPatrick: A soccer club.

Ahmed Ragab: This is one of my dreams. I say it out loudly in many places.

Patrick FitzPatrick: No way.

Ahmed Ragab: Yeah. I love the story of creating a soccer club and taking it from the under leagues up to the—

Patrick FitzPatrick: Take it all the way up to the top. Where? In Egypt? Abroad?

Ahmed Ragab: I still don’t know yet. But I’m studying numbers, I’m studying case studies, I’m exploring documentaries. I went into the finances of many things, many countries, many clubs. I’m watching this very closely.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Who’s your club?

Ahmed Ragab: Surprisingly, I’m not a big soccer fan. I’m an Ahly fan.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I was going to say, you have to be an Ahlawi or a Zamalkawi. One of the two?

Ahmed Ragab: Right, I’m Ahlawi. My father was an extreme Ahlawi. Extreme. And I believe he was disappointed in me, because I’m just an Ahlawi. But I’m not—

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’re not a fanatic.

Ahmed Ragab: This year, although I’m Ahlawi, I love the story of Zamalek. This year, I say it has to be a documentary. I love it — the idea of the underdog, of the one who, against all odds, won all the bad guys.

Internationally, I enjoy different stories, and I follow different stories, different leagues. But I follow this very closely. So if I’m not a retailer, I’ll put all my passion into this.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’ve got a 15-year-old and a five-year-old?

Ahmed Ragab: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You work in an industry that — sure, at the margins AI will do stuff with your business, but it’s pretty hard to imagine a universe where people are not transacting face to face. Retail brings people together.

But what do you tell your kids about AI? Are you worried about what they should study, what they shouldn’t study?

Ahmed Ragab: Not at all.

But when they ask me — for me, I’m not a believer of anything unless I see it and I touch it and I experience it myself. Do not tell me something that I cannot understand.

Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I still believe that the only thing that identifies us as human, and will always be human, is our ability to interact together. And if we remove this interactivity thing from our lives, we’re not humans anymore. And we were created to be humans, so it will always be there.

So that’s what I tend to understand from them, especially with my daughter. I go with her shopping and I just sit aside and watch her. What do you prefer? Why is this? Why is that? Why is this better than this? What is the idea of having this limited edition thing in your mindset?

This has created demand. This is not real demand. So I believe it’s the mindset that they’re building in this new generation: that everything is limited, although it’s not limited at all. The scarcity of the product is one of the main triggers for them to buy anything.

So I keep on learning, developing, watching, sensing. But whatever they want, I just watch.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What is the best and worst part of running a family business?

Ahmed Ragab: It’s like anything else. It’s a journey. The best part and the worst part is the family.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I can understand that 100%. 

Ahmed Ragab: It’s both. Depending on the situation, and depending on the dynamics of your situation, there’s no clear best and clear worst.

But I believe, as I told you, there’s no right. And this is what I developed by age: there’s no one clear answer for anything. 

And that’s what was very interesting in the Karen Wazen story — that it proved that a family business can have massive growth potential.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It could be a superpower.

Ahmed Ragab: It doesn’t have to be a corporate. And it can be a superpower, although it has its own risk.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Ragab, thank you so much for joining us today.

Ahmed Ragab: I really enjoyed it. Thank you again. It’s a pleasure. Bgad.