Me: (Laughing) I did that the first time I was sent to the market by my Mother. Girl, I got home feeling pleased with myself. However, I noticed my Mom frowning as she unpacked the bag. I quickly glanced at the list I was given to double check that I had not forgotten anything. I hadn’t. When she’d finished unpacking the bag Mommy turned to me and proceeded to advise me on how to pack the bag the next time I go to the market. That advice has stayed with me since then.
Barbadians have a saying that I like – book sense ain’t common sense. There are things that we can only learn by doing, through advice, observation, applying common sense and reasoning. Not everything is learnt from a book or an institute of formal education. I am confident that the advice my Mother gave me that day about packing the market bag, she learnt through one of the aforementioned attributes. As she relayed the information I saw the commonsense of the approach. By packing the hard sturdy items at the bottom and the tender, soft ones at the top, one could avoid items being squished, squeezed or bruised.
When I go to the market, as I shop, I am always rearranging things in the bag in keeping with the advice I was given decades ago. Last week when I took along a friend, I started at a stall where I bought lettuce, fresh herbs and sweet peppers. Next I bought a couple of dried coconuts and the unpacking and packing ensued – I removed the lettuce, herbs and sweet peppers to put the coconuts at the bottom of the bag then put the lettuce, herbs and sweet peppers at the top. Moving to another stall, I bought cucumbers, karaila, ochroes (okra) and spinach. Again, I removed the lettuce and herbs and arranged the vegetables in such a way that the spinach, lettuce and herbs were next to each other. I completed the shopping by picking up tomatoes, onions, cassava, and green plantains in that exact order. As the vendor handed me the cassava and green plantains, I removed the bag from my shoulder and placed it on a clearing next to the stall to take out the vegetables etc. to put the ground provisions at the bottom. I guess by this time my friend couldn’t hold back any longer and wondered about this practice (lol). The exchange took place as I unpacked and packed my market bag which concluded with the tomatoes on top next to the lettuce, herbs and sweet peppers.
As we made our way back to the car, she remarked that she never really paid any attention to the packing of things in this way. She continued, “When I go to the supermarket, the packer packs the bags and I never give a second thought as to how they are packing the bags.”
I responded by saying that some of them do a good job in that they know not just how to pack but what items to put together and which to separate, but some of them don’t, they just put items in as they come off the belt.
“You know,” said my friend, “from now on I am going to pay attention to how they pack my bags. The other day the bread I bought was squeezed up between the cartons of juices and milk. Come to think of it, there are many times I get home and as I unpack the shopping bags I shake my head wondering why the butter is in the bag with the toiletries, or the potatoes in the same bag with the laundry detergent; why the bananas are at the bottom of the bag!”
I consider this know-how that I learnt from my mother to be one of my marketing skills. I talk about it in the context of being a skill but it is also about not wasting money right? You spent time and effort in the selection process (for good reason) and you paid hard-earned money, therefore, it is natural that you want the product/item to retain its integrity until you are ready to use/consume it.
Do you go shopping at the market? How do you pack your market bag(s) or basket? Over the years, on the occasions that I have been to Guyana and visited Bourda market in particular, I see that many people do drive-by shopping – sit in their cars, drive by slowly with vendors coming up with various offerings. When did that become a thing?
Do you have a marketing skill that you’d like to share?
Cynthia
cynthia@tasteslikehome.org
www.tasteslikehome.org
