Bargaining an art about which much has been written about .Arab traders are supposed to get offended if one doesn’t bargain enough. For an Indian woman the experience of buying a sari cannot be complete without the ritual of bargaining. I belong to Surat which is the Mecca of sari trade in India. The textile industry is the heart of all the business in Surat , the diamond industry is also well documented but it probably does not have the same kind of presence in the middle class mind of Indian society as the textile industry does.
The nerve centre of textile trade in Surat is the area near the Railway station. There are many huge complexes, each having hundreds of shops selling just saris, the most famous of them undoubtedly are, the aptly named Textile Market and the not so aptly named Bombay market. These are the places where traders from all over India come to buy saris. If you are buying a synthetic sari anywhere in India or world, chances are very high that it was made in Surat.
How do I know all this because my mom is a champion sari buyer she knows these places very well. Of course Bombay market is her favorite place to buy saris. This is a ritual which is played out every time we are planning a journey to Kerala or we have visitors interested in buying saris. She will mobilize her resources and lead them to charge the markets in pursuit of buying the sari, which is both good looking and easy on the pocket. More often than not she is successful, but then she is a master bargainer.
The shopkeepers at these complexes will be mighty pissed if you don’t bargain with them. They have made every effort to make sure that you bargain. They have these luxurious mattresses with white cover on which the customer sits when buying the clothes. They have master salesmen, yes, all of them are men, you would be hard pressed to find a saleswoman, these men have mastered the elusive art of tying a sari, they model it for you, they argue with you, they talk in whichever language you want. And from what I have seen, they also seem to have infinite patience, they seem to be happy enough to show tens of hundreds of saris and model them for you until you find the one you are looking for. Now, if you don’t like any of them, they don’t hold grudges and bid you goodbye and move on to the next customer.
The process of bargaining
Once you have locked in on a sari or saris the ritual of bargaining starts, it starts with the salesmen naming a price. Of course, you laugh off the price; you counter with an equally ridiculous low price (at least 50% of percent of the above quoted price). Now it is the salesman’s turn, more often than not, at this point he will nod his head side to side , indicating his refusal and quote a price slightly lower than the one originally stated At this point you have 2 routes, one is to add another sari to the mix or walk away from the deal. But there is third option, and that is emotional blackmail, you could say that the visitors that you have bought with you have come from far, for example that they have come from Kerala, how can you let them walk away empty handed.
Depending on how badly he wants to make a sale, the salesman may decide to reduce the price a little bit. It still may not be the price that you are willing to pay, now you turn up the dramatics, you say you are not happy with the price and the final price you are willing to pay is say 60% of the quoted price and if the shop is not happy you will take the business elsewhere. For added benefit, it would be a great idea to make show of getting up or asking your friends to start making the move.
At this point, the salesman will start lamenting the labour costs, he will give you a rundown of the costs, cite the electricity bill, the labour cost, the raw material cost, the general state of the economy and for added measure to show his honesty will give you a figure (as ridiculous as 5% of the total sale) as his profit from the sale. But still he says, he does not want to lose your business, so he will reduce the price a little more. At this point, again you have 2 options, one is to quote the final price or actually get up and start proceeding towards the exit. The chances are quite high that the salesman will also quote his final price at this time or at least ask you for a round figure. And then finally you will have a successful bargain. The ideal price would be somewhere between 60-70% of the price originally quoted.
Unfortunately, I have not inherited the gene which make you a successful bargainer; I go looking for books/dvds/clothes in places but am not able to bargain. I generally look for a bargain as in, in a year-end sale or just buy cheap stuff which are not that durable.If you have any tips to be successful bargainer please let me know. Or I could just take my mom with me everywhere.
Filed under: General, Humour, Me Vichars about, Uncategorized
