Flea ting markets commodities, consumption and value in a flea market in singapore

Chapter 1: Introduction—Reclaiming the Informal and the Things
Within
1.1: Modernity and Shopping Malls
The advent of modernity seems to have brought about a significant rise in formal
retail and consumption spaces, such as shopping malls, in urban areas throughout the
world, and with it an array of distinct consumption practices that appear to be tied
intricately with what appears to be rapid economic development and resultant changes in
class structure and identity. Like most urban centers which pride themselves as ‗modern‘,
the nation-state of Singapore, in its endless bid to portray an image of a global city, has
attempted to brand itself as the ―Fashion Shopping Capital of Asia‖ and ―one of the
world‘s greatest shopping streets‖, by systematically and consistently promoting1 dozens
of glitzy malls along its Orchard Road shopping belt (Singapore Tourism Board, 2010). It
has been argued that rationality, often considered a characteristic and consequence of
such modernity, has influenced both production as well as consumption practices to be
increasingly subjected to ―McDonaldization‖, placing a heavy emphasis on ―efficiency,
predictability, calculability and control by non-human technology‖, as evidenced by the
popularity of supermarkets and department stores (Ritzer, 1993). This equation of
‗modernity‘ with shopping malls and department stores is also an unequivocal one in
much of social science, having been described as ―dream places‖ and ―cathedrals of
(contemporary) consumption‖ (Williams, 1982; Ferguson, 1992 from Chua, 2003).
1

Under its ‗Tourism Shopping and Dining‘ department, The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has a ‗fashion‘ team
that engages in ―strategic partnerships with the fashion retail industry and other divisions to optimise tourist
spending and augment their shopping experience‖ and a retail team dedicated to ―the tourism shopping landscape
and works closely with several strategic partners including the Orchard Road Business Association (ORBA), the
Singapore Retailers Association ( SRA), The Association of Shopping Centres (TASC) and Central Refund
Agencies (Global Refund and Premier Tax Free)‖ (Singapore Tourism Board, 2010).

1

The logic of economism and rationality seem to prevail in this very ‗modern‘ nation
state, where city planning authorities and the Singapore Tourism Board have worked hard
to ensure that the retail experience in Singapore measures up to the expectations of the
‗global‘ and ‗cosmopolitan‘ consumer. The consumption patterns of commodities sold in
these retail spaces have also been described to be increasingly ―cosmopolitan‖ as
Singapore is fitted ever more tightly into the global marketing strategies of goods (Chua,
2003: 15). Having always been seen as a ‗modern‘ city, Singapore‘s evolution into a
world city ―is but its logical unfolding as a modern space‖, with the proliferation of
shopping centers serving as the hallmark of its equally ‗modern‘ consumption culture
(ibid: 18). Chua also notes how according to sociologist Mike Featherstone (1998), the
saturation of shopping malls has caused overbuilding in Singapore, such that ―walking
through the heart of Singapore is like walking through a series of large shopping centers‖
(from Chua, 2003: 41). Recognizing the significant role of shopping malls and
department stores in Singapore‘s consumption culture, Chua has conducted a detailed
ethnography of Takashimaya, a popular Japanese-owned department store located within
the Ngee Ann City shopping mall located along Orchard Road. It would seem then, that
the consumption culture in the very ‗modern‘ city-state of Singapore has been informed
and shaped considerably by such forces that have pushed it to market itself as ‗global‘ in
its provision and consumption of retail experiences.
1.2: Street Markets—Vestiges of a ‘Pre-modern’ Past?
By extension, then, the converse was thought to be true of seemingly less
structured and ordered forms of retail and consumption practices. Cross and Morales
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have noted that with the growth of the ―modernist system‖ of economic management,
mass markets were required to meet the supply of goods mass production in factories
produced, resulting in ―total‖, massive changes in business organization and market
systems, impacting ―the very culture and social life of individuals, families and

communities‖ (2007: 3). Despite economic modernism being an almost ―total system‖
that required every aspect of society to be ―molded according to its requirements‖ of
optimal efficiency and productivity, modernists lamented the continued, albeit
diminished, presence of types of commerce that were thought to threaten economic
‗development‘ and ‗growth‘ (ibid). Street markets were one such form of economic
activity that was regarded with disdain by analysts as ―irrational‖ remnants of ‗premodern‘ life presumably associated with what was often conceived as ‗less developed‘
economies of impoverished societies. Elements of such ‗pre-modernity‘ are often
regarded as not only antithetical and detrimental to the growth of modern economic
systems, but also ill-fitted for urban environments (ibid: 4). Attempts to rid of the urban
‗chaos‘ caused by street hawkers were meticulously carried out by city-planning
authorities in twentieth-century Singapore (Yeoh, 1996: 243-280). Street hawkers and
markets were deemed unhygienic and disorganized, and thus an obstruction to public
order and health. Dewar and Watson (1990: 93) note that authorities in Singapore had a
‗three phase‘ policy for the removal of street trading:
The first phase consisted of moving street traders from main streets to
back streets and alleys and providing basic market-services for them. This
phase is complete. The second, and current, phase consists of building of
nucleated market buildings in both the city centre and the suburbs and
moving street traders nto them. The first of these markets was built in
1972 and it is estimated that by 1989, all street traders will be re-sited.
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Thereafter, in the third phase, authorities will concentrate on policing the
new system and ensuring that no further informal markets emerge.
Clifford Geertz in his classic study Peddlers and Princes (1963) has also reflected this
modernist strand of sentiment. He concurred that street markets and bazaars were
vestiges of a romantic past that had little place nor purpose in the ‗modern‘ world order,
and argued, from a cultural perspective, that the ‗bazaar economy‘ was irrational as it
―has the disadvantage that it turns even the established businessman away from an

interest in reducing costs and developing markets and toward petty speculation and shortrun opportunism‖ (ibid: 28-29).
The ‗pre-modern‘, ―relative disorder of (street) markets and merchants‖ seemed to
have little refuge in the modernist ideal of a highly organized and ordered world (ibid).
Efforts were made by the authorities in Singapore to minimize and regulate the presence
of hawkers, firstly, by passing laws that required hawkers to be registered and licensed;
and secondly, by confining such undesirable, ―fringe economic activities‖ to particular
pre-assigned localities, where the municipal surveillance of such economic activity could
be carried out (ibid: 262). Similarly, Cross and Morales have cited urban planning in
European cities as examples of how ―the `modernist dream of a model society‖ was
played out through architects‘ visions of an ―ideal‖ place where planned structures in
urban areas ensured that each individual was assigned to his or her place in life through
the physical organization of urban activity (ibid). Thus, in accordance with urban
planners in ‗Western‘ cities in the nineteenth-century, streets, walkways and verandahs in
Singapore were seen as spaces built solely for the flow of pedestrian traffic, and were
―areas to move through, not be in‖ (ibid: 268). City planners thus sought their solution for
4


such seeming ‗irrationality‘ through banning and over-regulating street vendors, while at
the same time ―redesigning urban spaces so that street vending could no longer exist‖
(Cross and Morales, 2007: 7).
1.3: Reclaiming the ‘informal’—The Flea Market
Despite the authorities‘ introduction of stringent rules to regulate the prevalence of
street hawkers, vendors, and markets, however, such forms of ‗fringe economic activity‘
did not disappear entirely into history. Notwithstanding the ubiquitous existence of
shopping malls, department stores, supermarkets and flagship stores of major
transnational brand-name products along the much-promoted Orchard Road shopping
belt in Singapore, ‗informal‘ and ‗alternative‘ retail spaces reside alongside2 such
‗formal‘ modes of economic activity, making the retail scene in Singapore an almostcurious mix of densely-packed retail spaces. The ‗wet markets‘ and ‗provision shops‘ of
the residential heartlands still sustain a significant part of day to day life in Singapore,

and have not given way entirely to supermarkets and convenience stores, and there also
continue to exist ‗night markets‘ or pasar malam3 set up along roads winding through
these public housing estates. More recently, ‗flea‘ markets 4have also mushroomed all

2

Some night markets, for example, are held right outside ‗brick and mortar‘ shop premises in Housing Development
Board estates. Recently, however, shop owners in Clementi Central estate have been said to be antagonistic towards
night market vendors, as they claim that the competition brought about by lower prices of goods at the night market
has caused a drop in their business ―by at least 20 per cent‖. Shop owners have also complained about vendors
blocking the walkways outside their shops and obstructing customer traffic (The Sunday Times, November 22,
2009).
3

See Chapter 3 for a description of the different types of ‗informal‘ retail in Singapore.

4

‗Flea markets‘ are a diverse category of informal modes of retail and refer to different types of set-ups in different
places. The ‗flea markets‘ studied in this paper, however, refer to a specific type of event-based retail set-up that has
been popularized in the last five years. These flea markets also explicitly refer to themselves as such. See Chapter 3

5


over the island-state. Unlike the night markets found in public housing estates, these flea
markets are event-based, held over weekends and usually only last for less than a day
(about six or seven hours), at locations all over Singapore5. They are also run by a central
organizer6 that rents stalls out to interested vendors and promotes these flea market
events through online blogs and websites. As these flea markets seem to target and attract

youth, they are forming a small but vibrant part of youth and popular culture in Singapore.
Thus, while modernist notions of economic activity have relegated street markets,
merchants, vendors and hawkers to the sphere of the informal, irrational and hence
undesirable, it has been suggested that the resurgence and continued popularity of such
business are, arguably, a condition of ‗postmodernity‘ (Cross and Morales, 2007). As
―reasoned reactions to local manifestations of today‘s economic, cultural, and social
world‖, street markets the world over are thought to be flexible adaptations to evolving
circumstances and conditions, successfully responding to consumer segmentation and
niche markets (ibid: 7). This has also been the case in more ‗developed‘ and ‗progressive‘
economies such as New Zealand (de Bruin and Dupuis in Cross and Morales (eds.), 2007:
245-261), the USA (LaLone, Godoy, Halsall and Matthews, 1993; Maisel, 1974; Miller,
1988; Petrocci, 1981; Sherry, 1990a; 1990b), evidence that street markets have not been
eradicated with the onslaught of ‗modernity‘ and ‗rationality‘. Other than the supposed
flexibility afforded by ‗informal‘ modes of retail, several other reasons have been cited
for a description of the type of flea markets studied in this paper, vis-à-vis other types of ‗informal‘ retail in
Singapore.
5

These locations include night clubs, museums and gentrified areas of Singapore popular with the young and
yuppies, such as Dempsey Hill.
6

Examples of these organizers include Flea-tique!, Flea Titan and Flea Fly Flo Fun.

6


for the resurgence and popularity of the various forms of ‗fringe‘ economic activity in
these societies—the ―action scene‖ of the flea market that draws people to it and causes
them to return regularly; (Maisel, 1974: 494); allowing urbanites to engage in ―more

personal, playful and sensuous forms of shopping‖ (Petrocci, 1981: 163); the
―humanization of the market process‖ through interactions between vendors and shoppers
(Miller, 1988: 59); and the ―anti-structure‖ of the market venue, which represent a
resistance to ―advanced capitalism‖ (Sherry, 1990a: 28), to name a few. These are all
meanings that imbue informal modes of retail with significance found beyond the mere
exchange of goods and services with money, according it relevance even with the
onslaught of ‗modernity‘ and ‗rationality‘.
1.4: Looking at Things in the Marketplace
This recent ―persistence and reinvigoration‖ of street markets (Cross and Morales,
2007: 8), even in an urban landscape such as Singapore that is saturated with glitzy
shopping malls, suggests that economic exchange in the twenty-first century goes beyond
the realm of the seemingly ‗rational‘ and meticulously ‗organized‘—it is not a mere
‗efficient‘ exchange of goods and services with money, but is instead intricately
embedded in social interaction, meaning and purpose. While the structure of the informal
retail settings and social actors involved have been credited to contribute to their success,
what Cross and Morales and the other authors in the same volume and elsewhere pay
scant attention to, however, is how the role of the goods exchanged in these spaces
contribute to perpetuating and popularizing such forms of economic organization and
social interaction. For example, Stillerman and Sundt (in Cross and Morales (eds.), 2007:
7


180-200), in their study of Santiago‘s7 street and flea market vendors, examine the
informal sector‘s ―flexible networks, enforceable trust and bounded solidarity‖ and how
these add value to the sector‘s businesses. Similarly, Sherry‘s (1990a) analysis of the
socio-cultural significance of the flea market in the American mid-west emphasizes the
actor-centered marketplace behaviours and processes, and the way through which these
give shape to meanings associated and attached to the flea market. What these works
have fallen short of considering is how objects of such exchanges may embody, both
metaphorically and literally, a significant bulk of the resultant social interaction, meaning

and purpose.
Another way through which such modes of economic exchange and organization can
be understood is by placing ‗things‘ at the center of inquiry. Appadurai‘s seminal work
The Social Life of Things (1986) treats objects as ―living beings‖ leading ―social lives‖
(Ferguson, 1988: 491). Instead of looking at commodities as specific types of things,
Appadurai sees commodities as a state of things, a certain situation instead of a fixed and
pre-determined category. Similarly, Kopytoff, in the same volume, considers the
‗biographical‘ account of things when determining the commodity state of an object. For
Kopytoff, culture ―ensures that some things remain unambiguously singular, it resists the
commoditization of others; and it sometimes resingularizes what has been commoditized
(1986: 73). By conceptualizing of the commodity as a phase in the ‗social life‘
(Appadurai, 1986) or ‗cultural biography‘ (Kopytoff, 1986) of a thing, it opens up space
for the inquiry into the exchange and circulation of goods in less formal retail settings

7

Chile

8


like the flea market. The proliferation of the sale of second-hand goods in these
‗alternative‘ retail spaces thus seems to contribute to the ‗rebirth‘ of things as
commodities, challenging notions of a ‗wasteful‘ consumption culture where the
commodity phase of consumption is pronounced dead upon consumption.
A study of flea markets cannot, therefore, escape an exploration of the ‗stories‘
the goods it sells have to tell. By giving credence to the study of objects and ‗things‘
exchanged at flea markets, in addition to its structures, organization and social actors, my
research aims to contribute to existing literature on the study of the ‗informal‘ economy
and modes of retail in several ways. Firstly, as flea markets are often considered to be

part of the informal economy, as opposed to formal retail spaces such as shopping malls,
the flexibility afforded to such forms of economic exchange (Cross and Morales, 2007)
allows for an ever more intricate look at the social relations and the nature of transactions
which stem from the complex movement of objects and things within this conduit. As
Maisel suggests, flea markets are ‗action scenes‘ within which a plethora of social
interactions, drawing on the informality of the retail set-up, are played out. By also
paying attention to the goods being bought and sold in flea markets, we can better gather
the extent to which such relations and transactions are commoditized (or not), and how
they differ from or similar to those found in more formal retail settings such as shopping
malls. Secondly, the proliferation of second-hand goods on sale in flea markets,
especially in a supposedly ‗cosmopolitan‘ and affluent society like Singapore, allows for
the exploration of the extent of value co-creation and emotional attachment amongst
consumers who buy used brand-name goods. Thirdly, this sale of second-hand goods in
flea markets also allows for a tighter grasp on how certain things may or may not be re9


commodified and ‗re-born‘ as commodities, and how we can situate within Kopytoff‘s
proposed spectrum of ‗singular‘ and ‗commodity‘. Finally, by considering both the
consumers‘ and vendors‘ perspectives, the ‗stories‘ the things sold in flea markets have to
tell emerges as multi-faceted ones that are intriguing not because of its fixity to one
particular ‗life course‘, but because it is rooted in a multiplicity that is complex and
nuanced, passing through the hands of both buyers and sellers.
Overview of Thesis
This chapter has laid out the theoretical and conceptual underpinnings of this
study. The following chapter (Chapter 2) will highlight its methodological guidelines and
premises, and will include details and particularities which are specific to the field site
and its participants. A brief overview of the retail scene in Singapore will be provided in
Chapter 3 to better situate the field site—The Flea—within this context. The origins and
conceptualization of The Flea will also be explored, providing a more detailed
background of its history. Chapter 4 explores how vendors use The Flea as a possible

business strategy and how they negotiate tensions surrounding the way they categorize,
valuate and subsequently price their goods. Chapter 5 documents shopper behavior at the
flea market and explores how these behaviors may influence the way these consumers
inscribe meanings and attachment into the goods they purchase and consume at the flea
market. Chapter 6 looks at how vendors and shoppers manage their interactions in the
marketplace when bargaining—a distinctive price-setting practice at the flea market—
takes place, as well as how judgments of value come into play in these situations. Chapter

10


7 then concludes by highlighting some significant issues and points that have arisen out
of this study.

11


Chapter 2: Methodology—The Study of a Flea Market in Singapore
2.1: Naturalistic Inquiry and Consumer Ethnography
Qualitative methods of research have been utilized to gather the richness and
detailed diversity of alternative retail settings. Maisel (1974) has used Goffman‘s (1967)
dramaturgical model of the ―action scene‖ to characterize the depth and diversity of
social interactions and experiences that go on between and amongst buyers and sellers at
flea markets. Using personal experiences as the principal point of departure for much of
his framework, Maisel studied the flea market as a narrative—―market myths‖ that are
simultaneously constructed and experienced by buyers and sellers alike. Following this
characterization of flea market settings as ―action scenes‖, Sherry (1990a) has taken
advantage of the ―richness of experience‖ that the ethnographic method affords, for his
consumer ethnography of the socio-cultural significance of the Midwestern American
flea market. In a similar vein, Belk, Sherry and Wallendorf (1988) have undertaken a

more focused and particularistic by proposing a ―naturalistic inquiry‖ into ―second order
marketing systems‖ such as ‗swap meets‘ or flea markets8. Taking place in a ―naturally
occurring context‖, natural inquiry involves a set of qualitative methods that seek to
―provide a rich portrait of the phenomenon‖ that is encountered in dynamic settings like
the flea market, where opportune social interactions such as bargaining take place (ibid,
1988: 449). The set of methods proposed by Belk et. al include observation, participation,

8

Belk et. al (1988) argue that ―the linguistic swap meet/flea market distinction ― in North America ―is more regional
than socioeconomic‖ and hence, the terms refer to similar retail settings. For the purposes of their article, the terms
‗swap meet‘ and ‗flea market‘ are used interchangeably.

12


and interviews, recorded through a set of detailed field notes, journals, photographs and
audio devices, all of which are utilized in the physical confines of the field setting.
2.2: Studying a Flea Market in Singapore: A Qualitative Approach
However, although Belk et. al emphasize the advantages of an in-situ collection of
data as afforded by a naturalistic inquiry (1988: 450), the motivations for doing so do not
correspond fully with the objectives of this research and the dynamics of the chosen field
site. Belk et. al were interested primarily in consumer behavior in their study, and given
the relatively limited time frame9 of their research, decided to focus on a single
―consumption venue‖ as their chosen field site10(ibid). The impact of such ephemeral,
informal retail spaces and interactions cannot be seen, however, as being limited neither
to the mere physical location of its set-up, nor as devoid of the larger consumption
context from which it arises. The interaction that arises from the organization of such
alternative conduits of retail, as shall be explained, sometimes extends well beyond those
confined to the physical field site, and includes virtual communication as well, which

necessitates some consideration of these modes of interaction. As with any research
endeavor, fieldwork in this setting of the flea market is not without its own set of
challenges. Situated in an urban setting, amidst the hustle and bustle of the city-state of
Singapore, the idea of a bounded, single-sited field site is but a myth. ‗Traditional‘
notions of ethnography give way to one that is, in this case, not only multi-sited, but also

9

―Data collection at the consumption venue proceeded primarily through four days of observation and interviewing‖
(Belk et. al, 1988: 450).
10

The Red Mesa Swap Meet located in a largely upper-middle class residential area in Pueblo, New Mexico (Belk et.
al, 1988: 459).

13


episodic. The ephemeral quality of the flea market confines and restricts the temporal
dimension of field work, but its contemporary setting in an urban locale means that field
work cannot be conducted in isolation from other goings-on in the city, making the
contextualization and linkages ever more important. Weighing both the advantages and
limitations of Belk et. al‘s naturalistic inquiry, as well as taking into consideration the
richness of data gathered by both Sherry and Maisel‘s ethnographic approach to the study
of their field settings, this study of a flea market in Singapore, as shall be discussed, has
been driven by largely by such qualitative methods of inquiry, including participantobservation, semi-structured interviews and content analysis.
2.2.1 Participant-observation
Over a period of about five months, I carried out participant-observation at flea
markets organized by flea market organizer The Flea11. By focusing on a single flea
market organizer, I hoped to concentrate on the richness of the context afforded by these

flea markets and provide the sort of ―thick description‖ so compellingly espoused by
Geertz (1973). The flea markets organized by The Flea during the length of my fieldwork
were mostly held at a night club along the Singapore River on Saturdays. These
‗sessions‘, as they are usually referred to by the organizer, vendors and shoppers alike,
took place over a period of about 6 hours each time, usually from about 2pm in the
afternoon to about 8pm in the evening, after which ‗regular‘ operations in the club
commenced. Flea markets held by The Flea were chosen as the primary field site for

11

A pseudonym has been used in place of the flea market‘s real name to protect the identities of the organizers,
vendors and shoppers who participated in this study.

14


several reasons. Firstly, the periodic and ephemeral nature of the flea market necessitated
the regularity and frequency of recurrence for the gathering of sufficient data. On average,
these flea market sessions held by the organizer take place monthly or fortnightly. An
exception to this was two consecutive flea market sessions held by the organizer over a
weekend at an art gallery, in conjunction with the gallery‘s ‗open day‘. These two
‗special‘ sessions had an ‗arts and designers‘ theme, where most vendors were required to
sell some form of handicraft or visual art. Because of these two ‗special‘ sessions, the
organizer held three flea market sessions in total, the third of which was held at the usual
venue of the night club. Secondly, having started in mid-2006, The Flea was, by the time
of this study, said to be a relatively well-established and well-known flea market amongst
consumers. It was named one of Singapore ―best‖ five flea markets by a popular online
news portal. (CNNGo, 2011).
To gain a more holistic perspective into the social interaction that takes place at
this flea market, I participated both as a vendor and a shopper on separate occasions. This

was to provide me with a vendor‘s perspective of the market and an opportunity to talk to
other vendors about their flea market experiences. As a vendor, I rented a stall for a
relatively small sum from the organizer, sharing it with close friends who sold their
unwanted personal possessions such as clothing, costume jewelry, bags and footwear,
alongside mine. Like most of the other vendors who sold at this flea market, I found out
about upcoming sessions from the organizers website and social media12 updates, and

12

The organizers provide timely updates about upcoming flea market sessions via social media platforms such as
Twitter and Facebook. ‗Followers‘ who subscribe to the organizer‘s social media accounts get updates on the details
and/or changes of sessions.

15


registered for a stall via email each time. Payment for the rent of the stall was initially
made via fund transfer to the organizer‘s bank account, and later on, in cash on the day of
the session, after rapport with the organizer was established. For all of the sessions during
which I participated as a vendor, I arrived at about 1.30pm to set up my stall in time for
the start of the flea market, and stayed until the end of it at about 8pm. This allowed me
to observe what took place while vendors were setting up their stalls before the start of
the flea market, as well as what went on while they were packing up after the flea market.
I also participated as a shopper at other sessions, browsing the stalls, observing
the going-ons, talking to people and sometimes striking up casual conversations. This
provided me with the shopper‘s perspective of the flea market. I also engaged the vendors
and shoppers in informal interviews at the market to have a rough gauge of how sociable
and ready people were to interact with complete strangers. As a shopper, I stayed for
several hours at each session, arriving and leaving at different timings each trip, just as a
‗regular‘ shopper would. I recorded pertinent information and quotes from the informal

interviews on paper, noting them down as soon as I had the opportunity. Extensive field
notes were also written down during or after each of the fieldwork sessions. Photographs
of the field site were also taken at opportune moments. Although Belk et. al discusses the
intrusiveness of mechanical recording methods such as photography, the ease with which
I could use my mobile phone‘s camera function ensured that my photo-taking actions did
not attract too much attention, and were not exceptionally out of the ordinary. As Belk et.
al‘s methodological proposition so necessitates, a naturalistic inquiry requires the
―interpretation of data collected in situ‖ (1988: 450). Hence, the output of such
observation, participation and interaction with others in the field in the form of field notes,
16


photographs, and audio recordings serve as important sources of raw data for
interpretation and analysis (ibid).
2.2.2: Semi-structured interviews
To supplement the data collected from participant-observation and informal
interviews, in-depth, semi-structured interviews were also conducted with sixteen
participants13—seven vendors and nine shoppers14. In-depth interviews are the most
appropriate format to generate data that is explored in ―depth, nuance, complexity and
roundedness‖ that a study of the ‗action scene‘ of a flea market demands (Mason, 2005:
65).These interviews were held with both vendors and shoppers at the flea market, who
agreed to speak about their flea market experiences outside of the field. The goal was to
gather nuanced, in-depth accounts of their personal perceptions and experiences of their
time spent at the flea market, as well as to provide a better understanding of the social
context within which the vendors‘ impetus for selling, and the shoppers‘ consumption
behavior and preferences arose. I got to know the interviewees through informal
encounters and interaction over the course of participant-observation at the field site.
Interviews were scheduled at a timing and location at the interviewees‘ convenience,
usually at public places such as a quiet café. As the interviews were semi-structured,
13

See Appendix A for informant profiles.

14

Vendors and shoppers in more informal retail spaces like this flea market are not absolute, mutually exclusive
categories. Many vendors are themselves flea market shoppers during sessions when they are not selling. Similarly,
many shoppers may become vendors at the flea market due to its low barriers of entry. This fluidity highlights the
flexibility on the flea market as a retail space. However, for the purposes of analysis, I have taken these two
categories of social actors to be conceptually separate, so as to more firmly ground each perspective in the
articulation of their flea market experiences. I categorized participants as ‗vendors‘ and ‗shoppers‘ according to their
role at the time of my acquaintance with them at the flea market. At times when I was introduced to a participant
through a third party, I gave them the option of identifying themselves as either ‗vendor‘ or ‗shopper‘.

17


impromptu questions about new points raised were asked when required and hence, interviews

lasted between about twenty-five minutes to about one and a half hours each time,
depending on the interviewees‘ responses and responsiveness. The identities of the
interviewees are kept strictly confidential and pseudonyms have been used in place of their real
names.

2.2.3: Content Analysis
Although Belk et. al, Maisel and Sherry limit their field sites to the physical
location of the flea markets they study, any contemporary analysis of social phenomena,
especially in an urban setting, needs to take into consideration the far and wide reaches of
content produced via new media. Social media platforms, weblogs and websites on the
internet provide a wealth of data for analysis. As The Flea uses their website and social

media accounts to publicize their flea market sessions, and are a medium through which
flea market participants can interact with one another, any study of these flea markets
cannot neglect the significance of an analysis of these modes of discourse- production.
Mason has recommended thinking of textual document analysis as ―constructions‖ that
are constitutive of social and cultural relations, rather than merely revealing facts about
them (2002: 111). An analysis of The Flea‘s official website and social media accounts
will thus provide an insight into how the organizers position the flea market vis-à-vis
their participants, giving a more holistic account of the social actors‘ interactions and
relations with one another, as well as the discourse surrounding flea markets in Singapore.
2.3 A Brief Introduction of the Field Site: Setting, Objects and Social Actors

18


The Flea was started in mid-2006 by a fashion designer and a sound engineer,
both of whom describe themselves as having a strong interest and involvement in the
‗arts‘ scene in Singapore (The Flea, 2011; personal correspondence). They describe and
promote The Flea as an ―independent flea market‖ and are not a registered business,
running it as a non-profit venture outside of their full-time jobs (ibid). They serve as the
organizers of the flea market sessions, handling all aspects of its operations including but
not exhaustive of, the collection of rent, logistics, administration, publicity,
conceptualization of flea market themes and the maintenance of the flea market‘s website.
On occasions when the flea market is held at the night club—as it most frequently
is— vendors fill both indoor and outdoor stall spaces, as the flea market spans from
inside the night club to the walkway outside of it. Some of the outdoor stall spaces are
sheltered while others are not. Music is usually played outdoors from speakers set up by
the organizers, while a disc jockey ‗spins‘ music from the deejay console inside the night
club. The night club‘s bar is also open throughout the duration of each flea market
session, and serves both alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Each stall is given a coupon
for the free redemption of one free drink from the bar. On a few ‗special‘ sessions, the

flea market was held at an old government building which had been turned into an art
gallery; and a café in a gentrified area on the fringes of downtown Singapore. Like the
sessions held at the night club, those held at these ‗special‘ locations also had stalls set-up
in indoor and outdoor areas of the establishment.

19


Vendors15 selling at The Flea can be categorized into three broad groups,
according to the merchandise they sell, as well as the extent of the commercial
motivations and investment behind their participation at the flea market:
i.

Owners of online businesses run online businesses (based in Singapore)
out of their weblogs (‗blogs‘) or websites and are usually selling brandnew clothing, bags, shoes and costume jewelry sourced from foreign
suppliers. Their motivations and considerations behind selling at the flea
market are largely business-driven. Most use the flea market as a platform
from which to promote their online business, and an opportunity to reach
out to potential customers.

ii.

Some of the vendors who are owners of online businesses are popularly
known as ‗blog-shop‘ owners, as they operate their businesses mainly
from their blogs or ‗blog-shops‘. Blog-shops sell mainly imported clothes,
shoes, bags and costume jewelry and operate their businesses in a distinct
fashion (Abidin, unpublished). As shall be discussed, many other owners
of online businesses who sell at the flea market also see blog-shop owners
as a conceptually distinct group of vendors. Like owners of online
businesses, however, blog-shop owners also use the flea market as a

platform to reach out to customers and to promote their businesses.

iii.

Crafters sell their handicrafts, such as costume jewelry at the flea market.
They mostly use the flea market as a platform from which they can both

15

See Chapter 4 for a more in-depth discussion on vendors

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display and sell their products. Some of them view selling at the flea
market as a hobby and an opportunity for them to indulge in their
handicraft hobbies, while others have more business-driven attitudes
towards their participation as vendors.
iv.

Second-hand merchandise marketers sell their unwanted personal
possessions such as clothes, shoes, bags, books, costume jewelry and
knick-knacks at heavily-discounted prices, possibly at a much lesser price
than what they had paid for. Merchandise are usually displayed on
portable clothes racks and ‗bargain bins‘ at their stall. The items may be
used or brand-new, but were purchases for personal use that were not
intended for profit from resale. This group of vendors seems to be,
arguably, the least business-oriented of the lot, and mostly aim to get rid
of their old possessions by selling them cheaply at flea markets.
Shoppers at the flea market start streaming in at about 2pm, the ‗official‘ opening

time of the market, and dwindle by 8pm, the ‗official‘ closing time of the flea market.
The crowd usually thickens from about 3pm-5pm. The number of visitors to each flea
market session, however, varies with weather conditions, with rainy weather bringing in
the least number of shoppers. Most of the shoppers at the flea market look to be in their
mid-teens to late twenties, with the exception of curious passers-by and wandering
tourists. In my visits to the field site, I also observed the social interactions between
vendors and shoppers that took place and pursued some of these as topics of discussion

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during in-depth interviews, so as to gather a better understanding of what I had observed
from the perspectives of the participants.

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Chapter 3:
Setting the Context—Situating Flea Markets within the Retail
Landscape of Singapore
Singapore‘s economic development has been said to be a major driving force
behind the development of a consumer culture that is ―comparable to that of advanced
developed nations‖ (Chua, 2003: 3). This has created a retail environment that offers
consumers all the major fast food chains, ‗big-name‘ luxury cars and fashion labels, most
of which may be found in the ―miles and miles of shopping complexes‖ that adorn the
architectural landscape of Singapore (ibid: 35). Shopping malls have been a widelystudied phenomenon of modern capitalist societies and have been substantial in much of
the literature on consumption and the economy. Chua notes how department stores and
shopping centers have been elevated to the status of ‗dream places‘ or ‗cathedrals‘ of
contemporary consumer culture within academic social science literature (ibid). He

privileges shopping malls as ―the prime sites of research‖ (ibid: 42) for his work on
consumption culture in Singapore, and documents how the set-up and organization of
shopping malls, luxury boutiques and department stores have shaped consumer behavior
and attitudes in very particular ways. The interactions between sales staff and customers
in luxury boutiques, for example, having been shaped by the space of the retail outlet, are
also crucial in socially producing consumers of high-end fashion and establishing the
customers‘ status as a fashion-savvy consumer (ibid: 56-75). The shopping mall and the
department stores and shops within them thus constitute a visibly and seemingly
significant portion of the retail landscape in Singapore.

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Additionally, public housing estates in Singapore have provided space for a whole
host of commercial activities, catering to the everyday material needs of residents without
them having to leave their immediate vicinities (Yeh and Yeung, 1972). The ‗selfsufficiency‘ of each housing estate has long been the Housing Development Board‘s
planning objective. Planning guidelines since the early years of the Singapore
government‘s efforts to provide public housing have ensured that ―wider-thanneighborhood needs‖ of residents are met through the stipulation on sufficient space for
commercial activities like community shopping malls, shops and food centers (ibid: 57).
The recent decade has seen an even larger increase in the number and scale of these
suburban shopping malls16, with many of them housing the same brand-name shops and
department stores17 as those in the shopping malls along the downtown Orchard Road
shopping belt. These suburban shopping malls are located within close proximity of Mass
Rapid Transit Stations and bus stops, making it highly accessible. This is in no small part
due to the government‘s efforts18 to decentralize commercial activities to the suburbs,
providing a one-stop shopping experience right at residents‘ doorsteps (Ibrahim and Leng,
2003: 179). Smaller ―mom-and-pop‖ shops located in HDB heartlands, have however, in
recent years, seen a large share of their business being taken away by bigger chain stores

16

The Northpoint Shopping Centre in Yishun New Town was the first such ‗modern‘ shopping mall to make inroads
into the housing estates (Ibrahim and Leng, 2003: 177).
17

Department stores such as Isetan and Metro, for example, can be found in shopping malls in residential estates
such as those in Tampines New Town (Tampines One mall), Sengkang (Compasspoint Shopping Centre) and
Serangoon (nex Mall).
18

The 1991 Revised Concept Plan. Urban Redevelopment Authority (2003) ‗Land use and urban planning:
Development guide plans‘, Urban Redevelopment Authority, Singapore. www.ura.gov.sg

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located in shopping malls, forcing many of them to overhaul their business operations to
attract more customers, or face the threat of closure.
The ‗formal‘ retail scene in Singapore is characterized by the ubiquitous presence
of shopping malls, department stores and shops in both the downtown districts and
residential ‗heartlands‘, and significantly meet, as well as shape, the consumption culture
in Singapore. Shopping malls, however, make up just one, albeit important part of the
complex, multi-layered retail scene in Singapore. There also exists a seemingly small and
less conspicuous but no less vibrant, interesting and exciting ‗informal‘ retail scene in
Singapore.
3.1: The ‘Formal’ and the ‘Informal’—Dichotomy or Spectrum?
Indeed, the line between ‗formal‘ and ‗informal‘ retail settings begs some
explanation and exploration. Several authors have discussed the characterization of
‗formal‘ and ‗informal‘ forms of retail. Informality is sometimes described as being in
direct opposition to formal forms of retail. Stone, Horne and Hibbert (1996), for example,

describe garage sales, arts and crafts fairs, swap meets and flea markets as ―alternative,
flexible retail formats‖ that can be seen as ―unearthed relics of simple, more direct
exchange processes that have gained new impetus and have challenged the more
bureaucratic, larger scale retail organizations‖ (ibid: 5-6). Such a description then implies
that ‗formal‘, ‗mainstream‘ retail formats are modern, complex and rigid. Clifford Geertz
(1963), in his account of commerce in Modjokuto, makes a similar distinction between
the formal ―firm-type economy‖ and the informal ―bazaar economy‖. The former is
described as having ―formal organizational innovation, the permanence of business
25