Sorrento Travel Forum

We are planning to go to sorrento next week. we wanted to buy a inlaid table, where is the best place to go ?. Can we bargain the price ?. How much discount can we expect ?.

how is the weather there now ,do I need a full length winter coat or a half jacket


thanks. K.G.

I can't tell you which is the best place: there are several, and it will depend on your taste and your budget as to which you consider 'best. I suggest you allow yourself time to explore the small streets between the main square (P.Tasso) and the clifftop.

http://www.gargiulo-jannuzzi.it/main.htm is the large store in P.Tasso.

Bargaining in shops is not usual Italian practice (except for market stalls), but you can always try. What discount, if any, you get will depend on the individual shop.

For Sorrento weather, look here:

http://uk.weather.yahoo.com/ITXX/ITXX0073/index_c.html

or here:

http://www.wunderground.com/global/stations/16294.html

Whether you need a long coat or not will depend on what temperatures you are used to, but it can get really quite chilly once the sun sets (I was there last mid-February).

Yes, bargaining is no longer de rigeur in Italy, but it can still happen. If you're buying just one item and the owner doesn't want to mess with you or if the person you're speaking with is not the owner/family member, then it can easily be a case of 'take it or leave it'. On the other hand, if you are buying several items or are spending a lot of money or are purchasing a particularly expensive item, then the shop owner may be open to a 10%-15% discount. As J says, it really depends...just don't try to bargain on something cheap (like few dozen euro), that would be insulting.

Note that if you try to bargain in Italy, you have to be serious about buying the item at the right price, not just haggling for the fun of it. Remember that this is their living, and they have only so much time to spend with each customer.

As an example, several years ago, I was in a wood products shop in Assisi with my wife and my sister and her husband. We bought a Nativity creche, and my sister and her husband bought several things. Since I am the Italian speaker, I got delegated the task of bargaining, and I think we got 10% off (I really don't remember - it wouldn't be uncommon if they threw in the cheapest thing you bought for free). Note that the total bill was well over 100 euro (could have been 200+).

On the other hand, on the same trip, my wife and I stopped by an outdoor food market somewhere (honestly, I have no idea where we were, Frascati, maybe?) late in the afternoon as the vendors were closing up. I went to a woman who was selling oranges and thought that she might be open to some negotiation on the price of a small bag of oranges, since it was the end of the day. She laughed and said in no uncertain terms that it was "prezzo fisso" (fixed price), and generally implied that I was silly for even asking. Oh, well.

Oh, I do want to make it clear that there is no bargaining in department stores or regular businesses not run by a family - employees don't have the authority to alter prices and frankly aren't going to bother with you anyway. It's the family run operations that have some flexibility, but, as J says, you'll just have to see when you get there...

Bill

Oh, if you stop by a flea market or one of those sidewalk vendors laying out his wares on a blanket on the ground, bargain to your heart's content, even to a 50% discount...but you probably don't want to buy anything they have to sell anyway ;-)

Bill