How to persuade clients to negotiate (and that they
might enjoy it!)
In 1906, Jack B. Yeats wrote an article for The
Guardian describing the Flat Iron Market in Manchester:
"Here you do not stand sourly while a pale-faced
short-tempered shopman whirls your purchase into a dexterously
twisted screw of pale brown paper and sends your money trundling in
a globe along naked wires. No; here before you make a purchase you
can slap and thump a thing, and abuse and sneer at it, and the man
behind the stall will slap and thump it too, and praise it; and at
last you'll get the price down to near to what he will take and
you will give. Then perhaps some old split-the-differ of the market
rolls up and makes a bargain between you. Oh, you can enjoy buying
in the Flat Iron Market."
