Business schools teach you the art of negotiation. However, this skill, of late, seems to be losing its value. Online buying and credit card promotions come with built-in discounts as you click. But for an Indian family, shopping without bargaining is totally unacceptable.
In the 50s and the 60s, I used to admire my grannies and aunts, who with no formal education, skillfully negotiated with vendors and struck great deals. It was always a win-win situation where the vendor went back happy. But somehow, I never honed my bargaining skills. Over the years, I have remained an MRP man. I quietly pay without asking for any discounts, much to the delight of the salesperson.
I did, however, try my bargaining skills once at Ajmal Khan Road in Karol Bagh, Delhi. In 1990, my colleague Bhat and I were going on an official trip abroad, but strangely both of us had forgotten to pack our handkerchiefs. When we asked our guesthouse manager about shopping venues, he said that we could get everything that we were looking for at Ajmal Khan Road. But he warned that we should bargain hard. It was not uncommon, he said, for a customer to haggle for one-fifth the quoted price. So I decided to try my luck for the first time in my life.
We took an auto to Ajmal Khan Road and quickly located a vendor who was selling handkerchiefs. He showed us a nice, soft and large handkerchief and quoted a price of Rs 500 per pack of 10. Then I gathered my courage and asked him, in my broken Hindi, if he would give it to us for Rs 100. The vendor smiled and said that his last offer was Rs 150.
Both of us felt that it was a good deal and bought a pack each. We went back to our guesthouse triumphantly and packed it in our suitcases. We then took our midnight flight to Paris.
We were to participate in a training course in Paris the next day. I had an early breakfast at the hotel where we were staying and got dressed formally. At which point, I saw Bhat rushing into my room carrying the kerchief pack shouting “We have been cheated, Desikan!”
I opened my kerchief package… and found one normal kerchief and nine miniature ones, neatly folded. The vendor had gotten the better of us, after all. We had no choice but to buy our kerchiefs in the streets of The Champs-Élysées! and at a price worth many times the money we thought we had saved.