Shopping

Shopping

Shopping is an activity, which is enjoyed by many people. There are also people who hate it and say its waste of time. But I think shopping is necessary to buy the things we need.

We can buy things directly, but it is also popular to buy goods by mail order. This includes buying things through a catalogue or via the Internet. Slovaks mostly use Internet to buy books, electronics, clothes and products they can’t find in shops. Door-to-door selling is not so popular in our country. More and more people get things by hire purchase, which means that they only pay a part of the required amount money for the goods and then they pay regular instalments. We can pay for goods in cash or by bank card. Sometimes we can pay by cheque, but it is not so popular.

I prefer buying goods by Internet, because there are usually more things than in our shops and I can choose from home. I can differentiate lots of things and then choose correctly. There are also some disadvantages like I can order bad size or I can pay for goods and get nothing. Therefore I prefer paying after getting the product or shopping by eBay. There is protection for buyers.

There are many kinds of shops. We know large shopping malls, department stores and supermarkets. But we also know small specialised shops like a grocer’s , a baker’s , an ironmonger’s, a butcher’s, a stationer’s, a greengrocer’s, a chemist’s, a bookshop, a shoe shop or a boutique. A grocery store is also called corner shop. It sells a wide variety of food. They sell also newspapers or magazines. At baker’s we can find rolls, fresh bread or pastries. Butchers sell meat including pork, beef, lamb, and poultry and so on…

Many people like shopping at the market, where they can haggle over a price.

A supermarket is a large self-service grocery shop. It also sells some other products such as clothes or household appliances. Department stores are large buildings, usually several storeys high. There are lots of departments with all kinds of stuff. Then we know hypermarkets. It is department store and supermarket together. It is usually surrounded with car parks. A shopping mall is a large indoor shopping centre where are many different types of stores.

Some people prefer shopping in hypermarkets, department stores and shopping malls and some of them prefer small specialised stores. Nowadays more and more customers prefer big centres. But some people say that in small shops are the goods fresher, if it is about food, and that the contact with the shop assistants is more personal.