The harassment of street vendors at Bit Pazar

The article describes the dispute between the antique sellers who had shops inside the arcades of Bit Pazar and the street vendors and ragpickers selling used items outside on the pavements and the square. The competition between the two types of vendors had intensified since the beginnings of the 1990s when migrants from former socialist countries in the Balkans and Eastern Europe started settling in Thessaloniki. According to Zermpoulis, many of these migrants engaged in trading activities in the wider area of Bit Pazar, alongside the shop owners and established antique sellers. The open air vendors often collected items off the streets and sold them at the Bit Pazar market, or bought cheap merchandise from the Chinese shop owners of Vardaris and resold them at Bit Pazar.

According to the article, the dispute between the street vendors and the shopkeepers was aggravated by the recession afflicting the local economy. As a result, both the shopkeepers and the street vendors of the area laid claim to the square and asserted their right to use it for profit.