Marrakesh Shopping Tips by iwys

Souks: Olives

Theme: Food and Drink

Souks: Spices

Theme: Food and Drink

Souks: Shopping baskets

Theme: Other

Souk Zrabia: carpets and kelims Carpets Review

There are thousands of carpet stores in Marrakech, selling Berber carpets and kelims, mainly to tourists. The salesmen here are some of the sharpest in the world and will manage to squeeze every last dirham out of you. Most customers later find out too late that they paid far too much for purchases that they had no intention of buying before they were lured in by a smooth-talking salesman. I bought a yellow, Berber kelim for a fraction of the original asking price, but stilll paid double the amount a local would have paid.

My advice is completely ignore the initial asking price as it will probably be anything from five to ten times the value of the carpet. Pay no more than half of what you would expect to pay for a similar carpet in your own country. The salesman will still have made a handsome profit and you won't feel that you have been cheated.

Souk Zrabia is the traditional carpet souk, where the Berbers come in every week to sell their carpets at auction, so it is probably the best place to look.

Directions: They find you!

Theme: Local Craft