The Dubai Shopping Festival ran from 20 January - 20 February 2011 and drew the largest number of visitors and sales in its history at this years event.
Likewise, held annually and located at various venues throughout the city, the Abu Dhabi Shopping Festival is popular with tourists and locals alike and runs from 1-31 March.
So if you're planning a trip to Abu Dhabi, neighbouring Dubai or any of the other surrounding emirates you could pop over for a bit of retail therapy. A wide range of goods are known to be exhibited and sold at very low prices.
See this range of Abu Dhabi holidays and Dubai hotels for your trip.
People fly from all over the world for shopping in Abu Dhabi for one of a kind gold pieces, electronic items, original clothes and branded perfumes and the opportunities don't end in March, sales continue throughout April and the malls offer the chance to win prizes too.
The shopping actually begins at Abu Dhabi's international airport which itself has won awards for its quality and efficiency. This stylishly designed complex features around 30 duty free stores in an open plan layout and you won't need to worry about pushy sales staff or irritatingly long queues.
Dubai is obviously set on a much larger scale than Abu Dhabi, and its shopping festival is therefore larger and in 2011 included a dazzling fireworks display at the Burj Khalifa and at the Dubai Creek Park. It was prizes galore up for grabs as well, including the chance to win AED 100, 000 in cash as well as a cool LX570 car courtesy of the Lexus Mega Raffle.
It was estimated that around 6000 retail outlets and 50 shopping malls partook in the 2011 Dubai event which offered discounts of up to 75 % on jewellery, perfumes, textiles, handicrafts and electronics items with everything duty free.
Both events are again planned for 2012 so if it's shopping that drives you, head to one or both of these events which tend to be planned in accordance with each other.
