Shopping in Delhi - Our Wool Peacock Rug

Besides shopping for clothes, I had my heart set on purchasing a rug to use as a wall hanging.  The first place we looked into rugs was at a government emporium, which means that the price is set and there is no bargaining.  Although we have our doubts about that policy.  Anyway, at the first place we received a very interesting and educational lesson on how rugs are made, how long they take to make, and the various silk and wool used.

The price quoted to us here for a small rug was more than we wanted to spend.  So we walked.  But we at least had a ball park figure for what this thing was going to cost.  We visited a second government emporium and received about the same price, but for a rug I didn't like quite as much as the first one. 

At this point we insisted our driver take us to a non-government store where we could negotiate the price.  The problem with this is that drivers get a kick back from the government run shops for bringing you there.  As do some of the bigger non-government shops, but the kick back isn't as high, depending on how low you negotiate the price to.  So you can see why drivers push you towards these government shops.  We made it very clear to our driver, Harish (who was actually a cool guy and we really liked him, even if he was trying to rip us off occasionally, which I'll talk about him in my next post), that we would compensate him adequately for taking us to a place we could negotiate. 

So we finally ended up at Nirula Handicrafts Bazarn in Gole Market.  They had rugs galore.

We had decided earlier we liked the peacock motif, rather than an abstract design.  And we knew we did not want to spend the money on silk, although they are very shiny, soft and pretty, but out of our price range for something we planned to hang on the wall.  Below is a lovely round peacock rug in silk, which was gorgeous (the photo doesn't do it justice), but we couldn't even begin to negotiate this one down to our price.

So on to this equally beautiful peacock design in wool.

And from here the negotiations commenced.  Chris and the salesman went back and forth with a calculator.  The clerk wouldn't meet our highest price so we said "thanks for your time" and got up to leave.  At which point he gave us some spiel about liking us, yadda yadda, and he would go lower than he should and give it to us at our final price.  Chris was so darn proud of himself.  He talked the salesman down 4,500 rupees from his original quote.  (That's $100 USD!)  Although the original quote here was 2,250 rupees higher than the government emporiums prices.  So I am glad we went to the government shops first so we had a general idea of what the price really was, which we used as a bargaining tool - "Nine thousand rupees!  The government emporium quoted us 6,750 rupees for the same rug.  We'll just go back there."  "No sir, please, we will work with you.  Here is a calculator, show me the price you want to pay."  Chris was in his bargaining glory.

My concern was getting this thing home without damaging it.  Turns out they pack up quite small and when folded the correct way it won't be damaged at all.  It gets folded the correct way, then wrapped in blue plastic, then a grain bag-like material stitched around it along with a handle.  They label it with your name and "flying carpet."

Our new beautiful wall hanging is currently laid out in the garage where it was being de-bugged (another long story, although it didn't really have bugs, as far as I know...) and now awaits for us to get it mounted on the wall in the living room.  I know every time I look at it I will remember our amazing adventures in India.  And Chris will probably only remember his amazing negotiation skills.  :-)