Markets in Taiwan: Home of many small businesses
Many countries have traditions of local markets, indeed. But I don’t think there are many countries that celebrate local life like the markets in Taiwan. They are a large part of life here, and there are many different markets.
Typical markets, though, are the morning markets which sell staple items: food, clothes, etc. and are typically open in the morning until lunchtime (occasionally, some markets are daytime markets and close at six pm); and the night markets that come alive after 6pm, and play to host to a different kind of client - selling all kinds of edibles, clothes, goods, etc..
Night Market ‘Grilled’ Goods Vendor
The picture in this story is taken from a night market in Tamsui and was taken about three months ago. I decided to feature a stall that sells simple but delicious take away ‘baked’ or ‘grilled’ goods because I tried the products, the products are inexpensive, but most of all the quality of product attracts a lot of business!
My favorite item here is the beef patty cake: it’s a beef (or pork) bun that is filled with a light sauce and covered in a light pastry, then it is cooked on a hot griddle on both sides, until the center is done, but the outsides are golden. When you eat it, you have to be very careful that you don’t burn yourself and that you don’t spill the boiling liquid on your nice new shirt! It’s quite an art. Naturally, I was too hungry to take a picture of the item!
The ‘Patty’ Menu
This store sells about six different items, each of which is priced from about NT$25-35. Pork and Beef Patties, as well as a Vegetable Pancake (these terms are approximations of the appearance and the Chinese, but in fact they are not strictly accurate). That’s about 60c to $1. The night that we were there was a Sunday evening, and the market was quite busy. In fact, we had to wait 10 minutes for ours, and there was other people queuing up after us. Business was brisk, but people were willing to wait.
The ‘Store’ Itself!
Actually, it’s an interesting ’store’ in a number of ways. As a form of fast food, the food is still prepared to order in as short a time as possible. The ’store’ itself isn’t what we would normally define as a store, it’s more a stall outside in a covered market. There are no doors, walls, chairs or tables. The servery is right on the edge of the street. Queues line up along the street, and sometimes even into the middle of the street. While this is not a classy joint, such business are typical in the business environment here in Taiwan.
Can he make much money?
The key question, though, is can he make much money doing this? It’s difficult to know the exact costs the proprietor has, but a rough estimate will show that to rent such a prime location, even though it is not a formal building as such, would still be quite expensive. Naturally, this would represent the single biggest cost in this otherwise family business. I would expect such a rental to be about US$300~400 per month or even more. Ingredients are basic and simple.
Given that a ratio of earnings to rental of about 6:1, (that’s an estimate), he would need to sell about 12 to 15 patties a day to cover his rental. From the brief time I stood there, I would guess he sold about that many in 15 minutes! I will have to investigate his costs a little further. I would also like to provide photographs of his edibles to share with you! That’s great, I get to have a trip up town! Yeah!
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13 Responses to “Markets in Taiwan: Home of many small businesses”
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I know what you mean when you asked, “Can he make much money doing this?” Malaysians sell a type of food called the “roti canai” (check this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roti_canai) and it’s basically JUST FLOUR. Of course it’s very cheap, but over time, people have come up with innovative ways to “incorporate” other stuff such as bananas, sardines or even an egg or onions to add value to the bread
I’m familiar with the N.Indian paratha which I LOVE! I’d like to try that roti canai… next time I go to Singapore we’ll pay a visit to Malaysia!
Kenneth
Very interesting post! I love the treatment you gave to all of your photos, too.
So it’s kinda of like the fairs we have here, where vendors have booths and serve food and items, but we only have these fairs once or twice a year.
Interesting that this is a daily thing!
Yeah, Kat, it’s very much a part of daily life here. I went back yesterday, one of the hottest days of the year, when I realized I didn’t have any photos of the actual items to put in the article!
UNFORTUNATELY, they smelled so good that I couldn’t wait to find replacement batteries, that we just gobbled them up! Oh, well. I’ll go again soon!
Thanks for the comments!
Amy, photos are handled by BlogDesk. Search the blog for more info about blogdesk!
I would love to be able to walk out my door for food like that.
I read your post and now I want to go eat. LOL You descriptions were awesome.
Like many Ameircan cities we have a few small blocks identified as “Chinatown.” Silly really, when you consider that Asians of every nationality live, work and market their wares there. I buy trinkets, art and tea there, but the street food is the real treat. It sounds like our market area is a miniature version of “the real thing” that you are so fortunate to have access to.
Nicely written and illustrated. I’ll be looking into blogdesk, too!
Karen, it’s one of the neatest features and really makes up for some of the crowded conditions that we live in! There are lots of vendors around our doors, and more come by during the day! Today, we had beef and vegetable in a kind of Chinese paratha! Very yummy. I’ll be doing a series of posts on local business, not surprisingly many of them will be about food! Lisa, Wish I could send you some! Took my camera to get pix of this post, but ran out of battery!
Skeet, Blogdesk is great! Works well and handles pictures nicely. I tried w.bloggar, but didn’t really like it so much! ChinaTowns are an important part of the meeting together, it’s the ‘market’ for many things, and I guess that’s why many people get together there just as here. It’s the ‘market’ for goods, information, relationships, gossip! And it’s very important. We’ve gone too abstract with our equivalents in our societies, and so we’ve ‘forgotten’ what these markets are like!
oh you are speaking my language with the food markets. Grilled items are awesome. PLEASE let me know when you get some pictures of food up.
Will do. I gotta go back and have some Taiwanese ice cream… so good! We intended to go last week, but we were held hostage a new dunkin’ donuts that opened… Sorry!