For these businessmen, their trade, it seems, is just up their street. For, Bangalore has some streets, especially in the old city area called the Pete, where shops on certain lanes peddle one particular article.
Here, competition is literally breathing down your neck, with shops standing shoulder-to-shoulder with each other. The shops don’t seem to mind for they have been getting along like this for ages. There’s a bit of the pie for everyone. For instance, a small deviation at the beginning of Avenue Road, called the Chowdeshwari Temple Street, is the haunt for wedding accessories. While some customers hop from shop to shop, looking for the right bargain, others head straight to a particular shop, having got a good deal on a previous occasion.
Further up Avenue Road, closer to its exit near Mysore Bank are stores overflowing with books. Shops here on either sides stock stationery and books on engineering, law, medicine and exam guides for students.
Youngsters fall over each other checking for their books, as the shopkeeper and his assistant bravely attend to a dozen customers simultaneously. Perpendicular to Avenue Road, in the bustling Chickpet, it’s silk. Any big name in the trade worth its yarn must have an address on this street.
For, shoppers from around the country swarm to the street to bargain for silks from everywhere at these shops, especially during the wedding season. One cannot pass the street without a salesman hired by the shops stopping you and asking you to step in for the best bargains. And in the catacomb of lanes of this street are shops that stock garments, dress material and hosiery, that attract even the most fashionable shoppers.
From lighting equipment, brassware, glass, bottles, plastics and acrylic at different stretches of the lanes and bylanes, one reaches another quarter called Mamulpet, for paper, inks, adhesives and related articles.
Towering reams of white sheets of paper are stacked in the shops and outside, with customers haggling amid vehicles loading and unloading their goods. Similarly, one can shop for construction hardware on Godown Street, electronic hardware on S P Road and grain in Tharagupet. The old Pete is thus a large supermarket, with all the articles in their assigned places.