Mercadillo and 2 euro sweaters

Last weekend I mentioned that Jose and I were headed to the state-mandated sales to try to find some work clothes that desperately needed replacing. We live pretty close to an outlet mall so we figured we would be able to take advantage of some great prices. Unfortunately this was not the case. We were quite disappointed in both the selection of clothing being offered as well as the discounts. Needless to say, we didn't end up leaving with much (I bought a pair of pants and a skirt for a whopping total of 12 euro). It was a bust.
View of the outdoor market
Since Jose still needed some new work wear we decided to try our luck at one of Seville's big outdoor markets that are set up on the weekends. I wrote about one trip we took there to do some Christmas shopping here. These markets are not for the faint of heart. They are loud, crowded, sometimes smelly (mostly thanks to people smoking). This particular market is located on a big open parking lot. Vendors arrive early in the morning and put up their stands. There are people selling all kinds of things: food, clothes, shoes, bags, accessories, cloth and fabric, most of everything available at a discount. 
Step right up and find your bargain
We were on a mission to find Jose some new sweaters for work. With our focus we quickly walked past stalls selling things we didn't need and before long found a guy with a table full of miscellaneous sweaters for just 2 euros. As you can see from the picture on the left they were just on a table in a jumbled mess. We had to pick our way through them (not for everyone I know) but we ended up finding a bunch of sweaters from popular brands similar to the ones we had seen at the sales the day before (brands like Cortefiel and Zara which are popular here in Spain).

 Like I said, going to this kind of market isn't for everyone. Some stalls have their merchandise nicely displayed but others are a bit of a mess. Some people, like my mother-in-law, enjoy pawing through clothes all in a pile in hopes of finding a gem. It isn't clear to me how the vendors obtain their merchandise, especially the name brands that they are selling. Lots of the people working in the market are gypsies which leads me to believe that some of the things being sold may have arrived there by questionable means. In other cases I believe they buy the last season's left-overs. 

 We left the market (mercadillo) quite content with our purchases and when Jose got home he ended up culling his rather immense (larger than mine certainly) wardrobe. We now have an even bigger pile of clothes to take to donate soon. We are still doing pretty good on the 2-4-1 principle. In fact, Jose cleared out an entire drawer of clothes which have to go!

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