There is no yeast in this place. Fruit and vegetables can be purchased at half price
There are no high prices here – say both sellers and customers who buy vegetables and fruits, or popular household chemicals at the popular Warsaw market. The prices of these products cost half of what they cost in stores or local bazaars. For some fruits we will pay only a third of the price, for others even less.
Sunday morning in Warsaw’s Wola district. Before seven o’clock, thousands of people head towards the stadium of the capital’s Olimpia. At first glance, you can get the impression that they are fans going to the match of their team. Nothing could be more wrong. Despite the early hour, holidays or another long weekend, the river of consumers seems to have no end. It is impossible to park a car in the vicinity of the bazaar, traffic jams form on the nearby streets. All seats are occupied within a radius of several hundred meters.
Cheap vegetables and fruits. They can be purchased at one of the capital’s bazaars
Bazar Olimpia quickly became a favorite place not only for the inhabitants of Warsaw. You can buy fruit and vegetables here much cheaper than in local shops, local markets or supermarkets. It also has its downsides.
There are so many buyers that it is impossible to squeeze from one alley to another in the morning. It takes a few minutes to cover the short distance to other stations. Buyers are hardly surprised. Most foods cost a third of the price. Some products can be purchased for less than PLN 1.
Vegetables and fruits at the Olympia bazaar. They can be purchased at a price of PLN 2-3 / kg
The longest queues are at the entrance to the bazaar from the western side of Moczydło Park. Both Poles and residents of Ukraine, Russians and Belarusians stand at the folding stands. They buy one by one. Tangerines, lemons, oranges and kiwis can be purchased there for less than PLN 2 per kg. For a similar price of PLN 1.99/kg, you can buy watermelons, grapes, sweet plums and bananas.
Potatoes (Irga variety) at PLN 2.99/kg and onions at PLN 3-4/kg are slightly more expensive. Other fruits and vegetables also quickly find buyers. Beans at the price of PLN 5/kg sell like fresh rolls. Sellers of blueberries (PLN 10/kg) or cherries also cannot keep up with replacing empty crates with those full of fruit. Sellers do not complain, although they do not have a free moment. One can get the impression that we are dealing not with retail sales, but with wholesale or even mass sales.
The cheapest vegetables in Warsaw? Tomato prices below a zloty
The sales hit, however, are tomatoes. Unfortunately, in order to buy them, you have to stand in a queue of several dozen people. Customers take two or three kilograms of these vegetables. Ordinary red can be bought for as little as 90 groszy per kilogram. One of the sellers weighs and packs the tomatoes into nets or bags, the second counts the money and gives change, and the third exchanges empty crates for full ones circling from the stand to the car. The popular raspberry tomatoes are a bit more expensive, they are the cheapest to buy at PLN 2/kg, and just before the end of the stock exchange they are even cheaper.
Queues are also in the cross alleys. “Cheapest donuts in Warsaw, only with me” another seller says. Price PLN 1.50/pcs. Many people ask about the price, even though it is visible from a distance and written in large numbers. It is also impossible not to notice the long queues at the egg stalls. Dozens of people are waiting in line before eight o’clock. The cheapest category S farm eggs cost 65 gr/pc; category M eggs cost 70 gr/unit, and category L eggs are the most expensive – 0.85 gr/unit.
Mushrooms can be purchased at half price. Long lines also for cosmetics
Customers usually buy several packages of eggs, each containing 10 or 30 eggs. Young vendors bustle about in the heat, but for the next half an hour the queue did not decrease for a moment. Within an hour, several thousand eggs descend. If it wasn’t for spending change, which takes the longest, because there is no possibility to pay with a card at the bazaar, the result would be much better. By 3 p.m. the large van was almost empty. There are also queues for eggs in the two adjacent alleys. Here you have to pay PLN 16 for 20 eggs in a package.
Mushrooms are also very popular among buyers. For chanterelles, kites or butterflies we will pay one third of the price offered by sellers at local bazaars. On the other hand, for half the market rate, you can buy boletes, boletes, porcini mushrooms, red boletus or plantain boletus. There are also queues for stands with cosmetics, washing powders and liquids, toothpaste. Small packages of household chemicals are a few zlotys cheaper than in the market, for large ones we will pay a dozen or so zlotys less than in the store.
The view from the other side of the bazaar looks interesting. Whole families come back, and each person carries two or three large bags filled to the brim with vegetables, fruits or other agricultural products. – We bought products for our family for the whole week – says Anna, who came shopping with her husband and two children. – We paid PLN 70 for everything he adds. According to many buyers, this is where you can do the cheapest shopping in Warsaw.
