Flea Markets

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Flea Markets

Markets where hundreds and sometimes thousands of people gather to buy and sell goods, flea markets are literally a material accumulation of American culture in a concentrated area. At a single flea market one can see—and buy—lamps, cookbooks, shoes, tools, clocks, toys, uniforms, salt-and-pepper shakers, cookie jars, ratchet sets, tarpaulins, radios, paintings, porcelain sinks, drinking glasses, bookends, duct tape, and candy dishes. The variety of goods constitutes the very nature of the flea market. New but discounted merchandise is common and runs the gamut from pet supplies, housewares, and tube socks to boxes of laundry detergent, canned goods, and toothpaste. Used items are generally household cast-offs, including baby clothes, furniture, stereo equipment, carpeting, and automobile tires. Flea markets contain objects both of the past and present, revealing obsolete technologies like eight-track players and Atari video games, and out-of-date clothing like bell-bottom pants, wide ties, and polyester shirts. Some people even sell antiques, not higher-end goods like Tiffany lamps and fine china, but more affordable collectibles like vintage pottery and prints. Flea markets may offer fresh produce from local farms, plants, and sometimes pets. Flea market operators often put restrictions on the types of things that are sold and usually prohibit the sale of firearms and other deadly weapons, stolen property, illicit drugs, pornography, and liquor. While most also officially prohibit "gray market" (counterfeit) items, these goods are usually in evidence at every flea market, with vendors selling imitation designer sunglasses, T-shirts, watches, and jewelry. Many medium-sized towns enjoy their own weekly or monthly flea markets.

Also known as swap meets, trade days, and peddlers' fairs, the flea market derives from the Greek agoras and other open-air markets of ancient times. It is believed that the term "flea market" comes from the French Marché aux Puces, the name of an outdoor bazaar known for the fleas that infested the upholstery of used furniture sold there. A popular pastime for people who frequent them regularly, flea markets allow people of all classes to enjoy a degree of economic power and autonomy—being able to buy or sell what they want at a price they more or less determine—outside of the highly regulated, inflexible, and taxable sphere of retail commerce.

Ubiquitous across the country for more than a century, one of the first American flea markets was the Monday Trade Days in Canton, Texas, which began in 1873 as a place where people would go to buy horses; later, they brought their own goods to sell or trade. Other towns quickly adopted this pattern of trade, but the modern flea market was supposedly the brainchild of Russell Carrell, an east-coast antique show organizer. Working as an auctioneer in Connecticut, Carrell thought to run an antique show like an outdoor auction, only forgoing the tent, which because of fire hazards was too expensive to insure. Carrell's 1956 Hartford open-air antiques market, he claimed, was the first modern incarnation of the flea market, although the true flea market does not consist of professional antique dealers, but rather of people looking to make some extra money on the side.

The different characteristics of flea markets reflect the diversity of the goods they offer and the people who attend them. Some are completely outside, others take place indoors, while still others have both inside and outside areas to sell goods. They usually take place at drive-ins, parking lots, race tracks, and fairgrounds. Paying a flat fee to the flea market's organizer (about ten to twenty dollars per day in the 1990s), vendors come equipped with tables, racks, and shelves on which to display their merchandise, or merely a sheet or blanket to cover the ground. Flea markets usually take place on the weekends, although not always: some convene on Fridays or on particular weekdays. Northern markets sometimes shut down during the winter while southern ones do the same in the hot summer months.

For all of their differences, flea markets and the people who frequent them have some things in common. Flea markets are characterized by the unpredictability in goods offered and the prices asked. Most certainly, every buyer is looking for a bargain—some hope to find valuable antiques and collectibles hidden among the cast-offs, while others look for utilitarian goods that are cheaper than in the retail marketplace. To this end, "haggling" is commonplace at flea markets, with buyer and seller both working to agree on a fair price, but using their own strategies. The seller "talks up" his or her merchandise to make it as appealing as possible, while the buyer points out defects or claims to have only a certain amount of money left in his or her pocket. Other tactics include, conversely, coming early to get first pick of the goods, and staying late, hoping that sellers will be more willing to unload items cheaply rather than taking them home.

—Wendy Woloson