Market Forces

Barbara is waxing lyrical about her fresh farm produce when she is rudely interrupted.
A man in a checked shirt and a hunter's cap is sniffing at her giant tub of homemade sauerkraut.
"Why don't you try it?" she said passing a fork of pickled cabbage in his direction.
"I don't want to," he answered.
"Then why are you sticking your nose in it?" retorted Barbara good-naturedly.
For 30 years, Barbara, a willowy woman with the brown skin and rosy cheeks of someone who spends her days working outdoors, has been selling her produce at the small market on ul. Ludowa on the edge of the Mokotów district.
It opened some time in the 1960s - no one is exactly sure when - and it looks in desperate need of an upgrade. There are broken-down wooden stalls patched with corrugated tin and tarpaulins, uneven concrete on the ground, and the remnants of a wire fence around its perimeter.

Nestled among houses and post-war apartment blocks, the locals flock to it daily, buying everything from giant free-range eggs with rich, orange yolks to fresh walnuts, and organically grown spuds to sweet local apples. You can even pick up a pair of panty hose or a leopard-skin negligee, if you so desire.
Barbara's modest selection, sold from the back of her old Polish-made Nysa truck, is grown on her small organic farm 30 kilometres outside Warsaw. There are cabbages, tiny leeks, gnarled roots of horseradish, misshapen carrots, onions and homemade ogórki and sauerkraut. Purchases are all measured on an old-fashioned set of scales and weights.
"I really feel at home here," said Barbara, 50, who spends two days at the market each week, and the rest of the time working on her farm. "It's a hard life, but I like it and it pleases me."

Thirty years ago, when Barbara first started selling at the market, she said there were more customers with more money in their pockets. Today, most of the customers are local pensioners who take advantage of the market's fresh food and low prices. Because today's buyers have less to spend, it's common for stallholders to sell on credit to customers waiting for their monthly pensions, Barbara said.
She worries about how long the market will survive, pointing out that property developers have been eyeing the space and are pursuing it through the courts. Fearful of a midnight raid on the market, the stallholders take turns guarding it.
"People have tried to come in here," Barbara said. "They want to take it by force."
At the other side of the market, Cecylia, a 68-year-old great grandmother, sells eggs. It's a family affair: Cecylia's husband, Zbigniew, their daughter, Krystyna, and her husband Ze-non come to market every day with dozens of hens' eggs the size of a child's fist.
"I enjoy coming here very much," said Cecylia, her weathered face breaking into wide smile. "I like to be among people."

But Cecylia added that the icy winters are always hard to get through. To keep herself warm, she has struck a deal with another stallholder, Roman: Cecylia brings the ingredients each day, while Roman cooks a hot lunch on a small gas ring for her and her family. Today, it's onions and liver.
"And he's a very good cook," laughed Cecylia's daughter, Krystyna.
In addition to the state of this country's economy, the other big impact on the Ludowa market has been the boom in hypermarkets. According to Krzysztof, another stallholder, the hypermarkets have enticed many of the market's traditional customers away. Krzysztof said he makes a point of never shopping at one himself. Like most other stallholders, he has his own farm and orchard on the edge of Warsaw and brings his products to market thrice weekly. He sells his leftovers at Bronisze, Warsaw's commercial wholesale fruit and vegetable market.
"I make a lot more money selling to individual customers at this market, compared to selling wholesale at Bronisze," said Krzysztof, who is a third-generation farmer in his family.

One thing he has noticed about his market customers over the past 15 years is that they are getting a little more demanding. For example, these days he washes his carrots before he sells them.
"But once I used to never wash them," Krzysztof said. "Now I have to if I want people to buy them. The customers want to see a nice product that's a little bit upmarket."
And with extra quality, Krzysztof said he can charge a slightly higher price.
For example, he sells his carrots for zł. 2 a kilo, while a competitor charges zł. 1.4 a kilo.
But according to Ula, another egg seller, the thing that keeps the customers coming is the freshness of products. Her eggs come from a free-range farm run by her parents.
"The quality of food on sale here is excellent," she said.
And all the customers get to haggle.
"It's very normal for them to bargain for a price," Ula said. "There are your regular customers, and we talk about everything - fathers and mothers, sons and daughters - so it's easy for them to get something off the price."
The Ludowa Street market is open Mon.-Sat. from 7 a.m. until 2 p.m. (the biggest days are Tuesday, Friday and Saturday).