Top bid for Chinatown CNY bazaar stalls drops 60%

SINGAPORE: The bidding war for stalls at the Lunar New Year bazaar in Chinatown has begun. The bazaar will be on from January 18 till the eve of Lunar New Year on February 9.

Guangzhou Wax Meat owner Yip Wai Keong made the top bid for two stalls at the junction of Smith Street and Trengganu Street, where human traffic is the heaviest.

He paid S$5,000 for each stall, 60 per cent less than the previous year. He bid S$12,888 for one stall in the same area last year.

There are 500 stalls at the bazaar and of these, only 50 were up for bidding.

Mr Yip had also rented two stalls in the area for S$4,000 each.

He said: "As we’ve already got these two stalls, it doesn’t matter if we win the bids this year. There’s no pressure to do so; we didn’t have to put in a high bid this year."

Stall owners said they are worried about the unpredictable weather and take a cautious approach when ordering their supplies.

— CNA/xq