Shopping crafts in BALI

Shopping for Crafts

The most important thing to remember when buying crafts is to take your time. It doesn’t take long to learn to distinguish quality. Leisurely browsing isn’t always possible if you take part in guided tours because the bus stops at preselected showrooms and galleries, but if you’re by yourself, you have all the time in the world.

All art shops accept traveler’s checks and major currencies, most accept credit cards, and some even take American Express. A surcharge of five percent is added to your bill if you use a credit card. Rate of exchange offered by shops for traveler’s checks is invariably worse than that given by moneychangers.

Much shopping on Bali still entails bargaining, a traditional and very acceptable way of doing business. Much to the relief of many Westerners, you may not bargain in fixed price shops. How can you tell a fixed-price shop? If it’s a hotel gift shop, it’s fixed price. And, generally speaking, if it’s an a/c store with glass doors and/or windows and the wares have price tags, it’s fixed price. But even if there’s a sign reading Harga Pasti (fixed price) or “Sorry-Fixed but very Reasonable Price,” and the clerk says all prices are fixed, always give it a try. Cut the asked price in half, then you may end up with a 25% discount. This technique used to work better but now the Balinese have responded by quadrupling their prices to ensure adequate profits.

Effective bargaining requires knowledge of the correct price. For a high-priced purchase like a big wooden statue or a leather jacket, do your research first and buy in a reputable outlet. Check out the price first in a fixed-price shop, to give you a good idea of what you should be paying, then hit the streets to see how well you can do. Bargaining is not arguing. Executed with good humor, it provides both buyer and seller with a mutually acceptable price. Prices may seem absolute, but they may not be. It may take you an hour or even repeated visits to clinch a sale. A few minutes spent in bargaining will usually obtain a 20-30%-sometimes 50%-reduction in the price. For more on bargaining, see the “Money” section of the Introduction.

The best time to go shopping is in the evening when it’s considerably cooler. In some hotel gift shops, prices are given in rupiah; in others prices are quoted in U.S. dollars. Always pay in rupiah, which almost always works out cheaper (if you’re getting a good rate of exchange). Also, Legian is cheaper than Kuta. In fact, the further north you travel on Jalan Legian (if starting from Bemo Corner), the cheaper it gets.

During certain seasons, prices are more favorable. French tourists start raining down on Bali in July and August, and Aussies overrun the island during the Christmas holidays and January schools break. But from March to June, crafts can be one-fourth to one-half the usual price.

To cut down on costs, avoid taking your guide and/or driver or agent into a gallery or art shop. Why? They’ll almost always expect the gallery owner to give them a commission. The majority has made arrangements with the owner beforehand and will always steer you into only those shops paying them commissions. This is why guides are always so eager to take you shopping.

Visit the home of the artist instead, saving yourself the percentage (10-50%) of the cost, which must go toward the commission. Often paintings that sell for US$2500 in the art shops on Ubud’s main road the artist sells himself for US$300-400 in his home studio just down the path in the ‘kampung’ behind the art shops. You can find the artist’s home through persistent inquiry, or in the phone book or by using directory assistance (tel. 108).

Don’t buy big-ticket items from street peddlers and hawkers. You’re just fresh meat to these shrewd professionals, and if the item is shoddy, misrepresented, or if you want to trade it for another you have no guarantees and no recourse. Just tell them you already have it. Stick to shops your friends have recommended. You have to trust the seller.

Where to Buy

Most of the big art shops are found on the main tourist corridor between Denpasar and Ubud. This crowded road, for a stretch of 25 km, is dotted with hundreds of boutiques and art shops selling every type and quality of souvenir, painting, carving, antique, jewelry, handicraft, ready-to-wear clothing, and woven cloth. The bigger the gravel parking lot, the more likely it is the shop caters to tour groups and the prices will be ridiculous.

Tour buses tend to visit only those places, which can accommodate the large a/c buses. If a shop doesn’t pay to get the buses to stop, it is destined to pine away into oblivion. These showrooms are increasingly located behind or beyond the craft villages. Vendors on motorcycles, offering carvings and paintings in US dollars, follow and descend upon the buses everywhere they stop.

In price, quality, and variety, the Ubud area offers some of the island’s best shopping. Shops lie close together and you can wander up and down Monkey Forest Road in a leisurely fashion. Another extremely dense concentration is Jalan Legian in Kuta/Legian, and the roads running from Jalan Legian to the beach. In the traditional village of Tenganan on the eastern part of the island, arts and crafts products are possibly the best that Bali has to offer. The crafts are not expensive, and it’s a great six-kilometer walk through thick forests to get there from Candidasa.

Hotel gift shops usually carry a good selection of the island’s crafts but at high prices. The cheapest and most hassle-free tourist shops are in Candidasa on the East Coast. Here you can buy a sarong.

The Sanggraha Kriya Asta (Government Handicraft Center, P.O. Box 254, Denpasar, tel. 62361-222942) in Tohpati, is just 10 minutes by bemo from Denpasar on the road to Ubud. This fixed-price art cooperative is made up of five roomy buildings, each containing an important craft-silver and goldwork, paintings, stone- and woodcarvings, textiles and clothing.

The center has always been a good place to visit to determine a fair price for bargaining purposes, but lately their prices have gone up. Though they have a large selection and the quality of the goods are high, the silver, woodcarving, and clothing are now more than double what you would pay in Ubud. Kriya Asta doesn’t give commissions to guides and their mobiles are still cheap. Open daily 0830-1700, Saturday 0830-1630, closed Sunday. Free transportation provided.

Don’t forget the supermarkets/department stores, where you can come across surprisingly reasonable items. In Kuta, you can visit Gelael Dewata, Jalan Raya Kuta next to the gas station on the way to Denpasar, and Alas Arum, Seminyak, close to Jalan Dhyana Pura. In Sanur, you head to Gelael Dewata on Jalan Bypass. In Denpasar you’ll find Tiara Dewata, Jalan M.J. Soetoyo, and Hero, Jalan Dewi Sartika; and Tragia right in the middle of Nusa Dua in the Galleria.

Matahari Dept. Store, in the eastern part of Denpasar (ask directions, everybody knows where it is), consists of three amazing floors selling everything under the Balinese sun-fashion clothes, cheap well-made non-ethnic Western clothes, stationery, household furnishings, sporting goods, untold racks of T-shirts. It even has a supermarket and a KFC in the basement.

Mega is a six-shop art shop chain. The main one is at Jalan Gajah Mada 36 (tel. 62361-224.592) with branches in the outskirts of Denpasar on the road to Gianyar (Jalan Gianyar, Km 5.7, tel. 62361-228.855); in Kuta at Jalan Raya Kuta 137 (tel. 62361-751.626) and at the Pertamina Cottages Arcade (tel. 62361-751.161); in Sanur in the Bali Hyatt Hotel arcade (tel. 62361-288.271); in Nusa Dua in the Bali Hilton International Arcade No. 15 (tel. 62361-71.102). Mega stores have a great variety of items, and prices aren’t too outrageous. The branch at the Km 5.7 mark in Denpasar’s outskirts is a huge emporium of arts and crafts.

Art Markets

If you have only two or three days on Bali, you may not have time to batter your way down Kuta’s Jalan Legian in the heat and traffic going into all the shops. In this case, the art markets of Bali offer an excellent overview of all the available crafts and souvenirs.

Every major tourist center and medium-size town has an art market. One of the best is Pasar Badung by the river in the center of Denpasar. Different commodities-cookware, batik, bamboo basketry, and fabrics-are all offered in the market. Bargaining is an absolute must at this huge multistoried market; it helps to have a working knowledge of Indonesian. More tourist-oriented Kumbasari Shopping Center, a giant market just west of Pasar Badung across the river, is choked with hundreds of small shops selling ready-to-wear, house furnishings, knickknacks, woodcarvings, textiles, jewelry, and other crafts. Prices are unbeatable. Sanur also has an art market on Jalan Segara on the beach, but prices are substantially higher.

The mother of all art markets on Bali is the Pasar Seni, in Sukawati on the main road from Denpasar to Ubud. A big two-story building with shops and stalls inside and out, this is one-stop shopping at its best. Very comprehensive and diverse range of basketware, place mats, sarongs, local fabrics, ikat, woodcarvings including carved fruit, the usual barong T-shirts, and lots of ethnic kitsch-all at the lowest possible prices. Offer no more than one-third of the opening bid. Two roadside shops here sell authentic dancers’ costumes and hats, rhinestone-studded gold leather angel wings, and other paraphernalia, but not cheap.

In addition, small village markets usually have small stalls that sell traditional implements to the Balinese; English is not spoken. Souvenir stalls have also sprouted up around all the most popular tourist sites: Tanah Lot, Tampaksiring, Goa Gadjah, Goa Lawah, Besakih, Tirtagangga, etc.

Don’t miss the fascinating, one-of-a-kind, old-style Asian market in Klungkung, just past the stoplight (coming from Denpasar) in the middle of the block on your right. Different sections-to the left is bamboo, ready-made clothing, sarong, and more. Good prices. One of Bali’s best-kept secrets.

Shipping Crafts

If you have bought quite a bit of stuff and want to ship it back home, sea mail (surface post) via the Indonesian postal service is the cheapest way to go. It will take a trip into Denpasar, Kuta, Singaraja, or Ubud to the ‘paket pos’ office, an hour of your time, and will cost around Rp4500 per kilo. Overseas-bound packages may be posted, insured, and registered (tercatat).

For a large quantity of goods, use one of the numerous air and sea freight forwarding services, concentrated in all the major tourist centers. These professionals assure secure packing and can arrange all the paperwork and permit to ensure your shipment’s safe arrival. They also provide pick up service. Cost depends on the weight of the goods and the destination.

Beware of all the ludicrous add-on costs like the “Archaeology Certificate” and the “Container Freight Station” charge which could double ocean freight bill (150 kg). For more on shipping parcels overseas, refer to “Information and Services” in the On the Road chapter.