Talk:Shopping

Locations

I´m not sure this section is going to be useful without becoming an enormously long list (which also isn't useful). There are just too many good places for shopping in the world. And what's with the link to an outline article in Sweden? This kind of thing goes in the Buy section of countries and continental sections and regions, but to make one big list here is just too much. Texugo (talk) 12:09, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Texugo I'm afraid - this isn't going to help anyone if it aims to assemble a list of places to shop. The only thing this page could be useful for is perhaps more general shopping tips, e.g. where/when to haggle. I think it needs a more specific purpose than its current remit. --Nick (talk) 16:13, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

And we already have How to haggle. Texugo (talk) 16:16, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree. A big list is pointless.

I think we might get a useful article here by making it an index to various shopping-related articles such as haggle and duty-free shopping. It should not, in my view, try to replace or incorporate any of those. Pashley (talk) 19:43, 10 March 2013 (UTC)

The location list is deleted. Please contribute with other general advice for shopping. /Yvwv (talk) 01:15, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Getting it home

I thought we had a travel topic about various common ways to ship larger purchases home, but I don't find one. Perhaps we could start some information here. Texugo (talk) 01:46, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Thoughts on Souvenirs

If this is appropriate, I'll add it to the article. If not, where would it go? .... Wyote (talk) 09:33, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

There are of course no rules. Well, there are a few rules: the law. Good luck to you if you choose to break them. It's probably illegal to carry fragments of someone's archaeological heritage back to your hometown. And if it isn't, it probably should be. Don't be a jerk.

But within the generally wide latitude of the law and non-jerkhood, there are no rules. You might be the one who really wants to put a jackalope on your wall, to carry around a miniature Eiffel tower on your keychain, and to wear a tee-shirt that says, "I got laid in Chicken, Alaska." You know yourself, or you should, so what follows can best be considered something like a guide to introspection.

The key words to souvenir collection have to be "ethics" and "character." Also, for most of us poor fools, "price."

As we all know, MegaCorporation, LLC, Inc. manufactures plastic stuff on one side of the world and ships it to the other side for sale to tourists whose judgment is impaired by mild cases of heat exhaustion. You have to decide how you feel about that. Nick-nacky kitschy stuff like bobble-head hula dancers can be undeniably fun. You might even want an "I (heart) NY" frisbee or a pet rock with moss that spells out "Vermont." You might as well realize in advance that none of that is going to greatly interest the folks back home, or look very good on the mantle once you get a real job. But if you live three more decades and find it one day when you're digging through your own attic, you might enjoy remembering what a doofus you were when you took that trip. Or your grand-nephew will think that for you when he finds it. But that cute little Machu Picchu snow globe was made in an Asian sweatshop (it probably says so on the bottom, though it won't mention the child labor that was involved), and the person you're giving it to will assume that you got it in the airport on your way out, and you probably paid as much for it as you would've paid for a little bottle of pisco that would've been much more deeply appreciated by anyone whose religious belief and lifestyle choices allow them to enjoy it - besides that, it would've supported the local economy.

With taste there is no argument, but for most people, authentic stuff, even if it's cheap, usually feels better longer. If your personal tastes tend to the tacky, you can still find unique things, something with character: a green glow-in-the-dark Virgin Mary from a random little Catholic church in Vietnam, a Kierkegaard refrigerator magnet from Copenhagen, even a little jar of authentic maple syrup with a maple leaf on the label from Canadia. But if you aspire to a less ironic sort of class, look around a bit, find some locally made cloth, tableware, jewelry (even inexpensive bead necklaces). Maybe some clothing that you can actually wear back home: swanky silk PJs might be nice, or a kimono (I think there is a page to link to for that). If you get a genuine panama hat in Montecristi, wear it without shame, hombre.

Something that you were given can be particularly memorable: if an old man in Bago wants to trade his forty-year-old trilingual copy of the Dhammapada for your glossy Penguin version, for Buddha's sake, take it! The picture that a little Nepalese kid draws in your diary is probably going to be much more precious to you (and less embarrassing) after a few years than all your self-indulgent "reflections."

The ultimate souvenirs are the memories of your trip: the time you got drunk with some friendly strangers in some remote Vietnamese village, the epiphany you had while failing to meditate at a temple in India, the time you thought you were going to die of food poisoning. You can't plan that stuff most of the time, but you can plan to learn to dance salsa in Cali, or to cook Thai food in Chiang Mai. Such immaterial souvenirs definitely impress attractive and interesting members of whatever sex you prefer, in case that is a concern, and they are easy to pack when you move, too. As you get them, you might even make new friends - friendship is the ultimate immaterial souvenir. One of the kids from that Korean family that let you help make kimchi is going to show up at your house in Kansas someday, and then you can show him what a real cheeseburger is.

Back to the merely material, to find good deals, absolutely avoid the tourist shops, especially the ones right next to the airports or on the way out of major attractions. (If you need to be told that, you're probably hopeless, but there are some interesting folks in the world, and we aim to help them all.) Sometimes it's fun to know you're getting ripped off - so you ironic types might enjoy buying black market "jewels" in Myanmar - but there is a consequence to this kind of thing because it incentivizes dishonesty. You can help the local economy, but an ethical tourist would buy from ethical sellers. There's a page about haggling that should get a link here.

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A lot of that is great! I don't know whether it should go here or go in a dedicated Souvenirs article or what. If it were to go here, the text above might have to be split into the various existing sections and the text and the existing article would have to be adapted to each other to match tone and content. It might be a good start for a standalone Souvenirs article, but then again, I don't know if there is enough unique stuff to say about souvenirs versus shopping in general, and I don't know if that's how we want to cover it - it needs discussion.

One note: though I like most of the examples you've come up with, Cali would be a place to learn salsa, not samba, which is unique to Brazil. Texugo (talk) 11:57, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Thank you! I fixed that. When I was writing that originally, I imagined it as a separate article on souvenirs, but then I saw this and wondered if it should go here. I'd be happy to make an article on souvenirs Wyote (talk) 15:02, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Some great ideas. And I like the tone overall, although sometimes it might be a bit to informal. Hobbitschuster (talk) 15:15, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Rename

I propose renaming this article to Buy, to match our article section headers. Powers ^(talk) 13:34, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree. Hobbitschuster (talk) 13:43, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

I oppose that. The topics overlap hugely but are not identical & I think "Shopping" reads better. A redirect from Buy would be OK. Pashley (talk) 14:59, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

We can have a generalized Buy article about all kinds of purchases (travel supplies, etc), and a shopping sub-article with more of a recreational point of view. /Yvwv (talk) 15:04, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Pashley, if you think the topics are not identical, why would you suggest a redirect? Also, what do you think the difference is? Powers ^(talk) 01:46, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Well done

As a very frequent user of WT, thanks to all who developed this article. Will contribute (modestly) in the coming months. Hennejohn (talk) 16:06, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

WT? Typo? Hobbitschuster (talk) 16:27, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Aggressive vendors

I've repeatedly had this problem in China, but I'm sure it happens elsewhere too.

You are wandering through a market looking at things on display when a vendor spots you & begins waving some item at you and extolling its virtues, often in a language you do not speak. This has happened to me many times and not even once was the item being waved something of any interest to me; often it was something I would not have taken if it were free. More than once I have walked away from a display that did include items of interest, because the vendor was being irritating in this way.

This happened often enough that I considered getting cards printed up telling the vendors to leave me alone if they wanted any chance of a sale, but I never got around to it. If anyone has a better suggestion, it would be worth adding to the article. Pashley (talk) 01:01, 3 June 2021 (UTC)

Department stores

Should we really be listing individual department stores? I suppose there are a couple of "iconic or historic" ones in nearly any big city. Can we keep such a list manageable and useful? And if we can get down to a few truly iconic and historic (I think we shouldn't have an "or" there), shouldn't those going somewhere just to visit a department store know about it without us telling? Perhaps the idea is to tell those who have went to Galleries Lafayette, Harrod's, Macy's and La Rinascente too many times, that there are iconic places also on the other side of the globe? Still, is such a list manageable? Once the historic and iconic Nordiska Kompaniet gets to the list, I suppose the battle is lost. –LPfi (talk) 16:36, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Admittedly, this is a tough line to draw, but there are some department stores that are tourist attractions that you are likely to want to visit even if you're not planning to buy anything. For instance, Harrod's in London or Macy's in New York City are among those "must see" tourist sites. The dog2 (talk) 17:16, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes. But is it enough to mention them in the city (and country?) articles. Will your decision to go to London be influenced by your reading about Harrod's here? Otherwise we need not mention it in this kind of global article. Or are these just meant as examples, perhaps as examples our readers will recognise? In that case they shouldn't be in a list, but in the prose. –LPfi (talk) 17:39, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Hmm, some of the very most famous department stores (7 2 could be an upper limit?) can be mentioned here but maybe prose is better than the current list. --Ypsilon (talk) 17:49, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I think these are just examples. Where I would draw the line is that if it's a department store that you will likely only go to if you're looking to buy something, we should not list it here. But if it's a tourist attraction that you are likely to want to visit just to have a look even if you are absolutely sure you won't be buying anything, then we could consider a listing here. The dog2 (talk) 17:53, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Those would be in the thousands. I think that regardless of whether we include a 7±2 list, the important part is the prose about why you would like to go to such a plce without intentions to buy anything, and that prose could include the 7±2 examples. –LPfi (talk) 18:09, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

With the exception of Busan's Shinsegae, these are all historic department stores located in historical buildings with nice architectural features. Busan's Shinsegae is simple because it is the largest department store in the world. Or should we spin off a separate article on department stores? The dog2 (talk) 18:42, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I am just afraid that there are tens or hundreds of historic department stores located in historical buildings with nice architectural features. But we can start that article here and see what happens. I still think the prose is what is important. I'd guess there is at least one worthy in each of London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, New York, Saint Petersburg, Moscow, Delhi, Abu Dhabi, Peking, Tokyo and São Paulo. Of your ten cities, Kyoto, Milan, Busan and Tainan were not on that list. So instead of 7±2 we have 16+. But how many of those cities are not obvious to anyone interested in shopping? They could as well check the Buy sections of our articles on those cities. For the section to be worthwhile we need to tell something more. Of course we should check that the places on your list indeed can be found by cursory reading of the city articles. –LPfi (talk) 19:26, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't know how this will go, but there is a similar topic that exists: Grand old hotels. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:30, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I lean to the idea that this list is not useful. We already cover many stores in city articles & should add any important ones we've missed there. This article already mentions that local department stores are an option for travellers. That is enough.

If we do keep it, it should move to its own section, not a sub-heading under "good places" to shop where it now resides. Pashley (talk) 23:00, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

I moved it. Pashley (talk) 07:46, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

I also expanded it some, so it now has a more general discussion of department stores, not just a list of famous ones. Of course I think my text is worth keeping, but I'm still not sure about the list. Pashley (talk) 08:13, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

The addition looks good. I do think there is scope to mention some famous department stores around the world like Macy's, Harrod's, Galeries Lafayette and Mitsukoshi though. If not in list, maybe in the prose. I visited the Hayashi Department Store in Tainan the last time I visited Taiwan, and it's pretty interesting not only for being in a historical building (albeit on the small side compared to most modern department stores), but also for its focus on cool local Taiwanese products instead of the big international brands, but if it's not significant enough, I'd understand. The dog2 (talk) 17:49, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

We now have Legacy retailers so likely some text here could be replaced with a link. Pashley (talk) 00:35, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

US Notorious Markets List...

The following publication , lists some markets that are perceived as hotspots for counterfiet/fake items:- https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/IssueAreas/IP/2021%20Notorious%20Markets%20List.pdf

Should this be linked in the article here? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:13, 22 February 2022 (UTC)