BARGAIN HUNTING IN COLOGNE

Hokitika Guardian, 15 May 1920, Page 4

BARGAIN HUNTING IN COLOGNE

RHINE AiUil', COLOGNE. !

All tlio Uoojja in Cologne just now seem to have turned themselves into amateur bargain-hunters, and a huge business is being done in sending home parcels, 'hhe result is a queue ol oineers and “other ranks” standing m front ol the counter at the military post-office from morning to night. The items in chief request seem to be cameras, field-glasses, razors, and of course the inevitable Eau-de-Cologne. Clocks, watches, cigarette cases and velour hat also have a big sale; and officers’ wives, who are just as keen as anyone else on a. bargain, tell me that house lipid linen, cooking utensils, bead bags, amber, gloves, and furs are three times cheaper and four times better in Cologne than in London. . 1 fancy they are not far wrong. Anyway, I have just bought myself a. pair of reindeer gloves for the equivalent of less than Os. Of course, the soldier who is making a business of it‘merely buys to sell again. Wonderful tales are dying about in every mess as to the bargains being picked up for an “old song” and subsequently disposed ol in England at a colossal profit to the original purchaser. Most of these stories are much exaggerated. Yet there is a certain amount of truth in them, all the same,; and anybody who knows where and what to buy and—more still —where to re-sell) can do a good stroke of business. Thus, Goerz cameras and Zeiss glasses, although steadily mounting up in price, cost a lot less here than in London. The other day I met a subaltern who paid £3 for a camera. A London linn to whom lie showed it when on leave was very anxious to give him £7 for it. On passing the shop the next morning the vendor saw it in the window ticketed £l2 12s.

Some officers out here seem to be acting as amateur commercial travellers. Thus, instead of purchasing an. occasion, a] article for a friend at home, they arrange with English houses beforehand to receive regular consignments oi' wrist watches, velours hats, cutlery, purses, anil manicure sets.

Theiy tell me that -this is a source of income to them. Quite recently 1 came across a captain who having bought an alarm clock for half a crown and sold it for 10s, promptly went back and ordered six dozen more.

I suppose it is all right. Still, • it does not strike me as'being entirely the tiring. I have also come across an officers’ wife in Cologne who has made quite a fair sum by sending such articles as table centres and teaeloths to "a big Manchester house. Certainly she sells them for very littie, but, then, she is clever enough to buy them for a good; deal less. , Although “bargains” are to be had here, they are not to be picked up so easily as was the case in the eailj days. The local tradesmen are becoming sopliisticated and are advancing their prices as the mark falls. Still, if one avoids the smart shops in the 'Ho-; hestrasse and Dorn Tiatz and visits ’ the; back streets round the Altmarkt instead, snbfjantuJj redactions can be ascured.