Final Nail in the Coffin for Long Beleaguered Alien Street; Set to Close by End of February

Hou had not only resorted to selling the luggage at her stall at half price – she'll also soon have to pack up some bags of her own and move on. The vendor at Chaoyangmen's Alien Street Market said she was sad that the popular shopping spot would be closing by month's end, leaving sellers like her to find new places to hawk their wares.

"It's going to make my life much more difficult. I had really good business here, and the rent was lower than other places," she said of losing her place of business, as she glanced at neighboring stalls that were already papered up. Hou said she and several other vendors will move their businesses to Ritan International Trade Center (日坛国际贸易中心). She said: "I have too many things in stock, I can't give up, so I'll keep selling from there." 

Nearly half the stalls on Alien Street's first floor were closed when we stopped by recently, while the entire second floor is already completely vacated (some of the stalls might reopen temporarily as sellers make a final push before the closure at the end of this month).

Though the market has long been in decline since news about its pending closure a few years ago, Alien Street has hung on. Based on comments from the vendors we spoke to, and the way they many of them were resorting to clearance prices and packing up on the weekend, this would appear to be the final nail in the coffin. We called the market’s management office and though they could not confirm the specific closure date, they did echo the vendors’ comments.

Also commonly referred to as the Russian Market, thanks to its Russian-speaking staff and Cyrillic signage, Alien Street is not as famous as Yashow, the Silk Market or the Pearl Market, but seasoned Beijing shoppers often preferred it to those better known alternatives because its vendors were less agressive.

One upside for shoppers: plenty of dirt cheap bargains. Aside from Hou's half-price luggage, there vendors selling sneakers between RMB 40-60, belts ranging from RMB 5-10, and other deep discounts on shawls, scarves, costume jewelry, and hair bands. If you bargain aggressively, you should be able to get even better deals.

Another vendor named Lina Dai, who was selling bags of garden seeds for vegetables, cucumbers, and other vegetables. "I'm just going to quit and find another line of work. It'll be hard for me to make a profit at Ritan International Trade Center, it's not worth it."

READ: Which Beijing Wholesale Markets Are Still Standing?

Dai said that the market managers told her they were shutting down the complex in order to give it major renovations and reopen in a fancier form. While those forthcoming unfeasible rent rates are bad news for vendors like Hou and Dai, it also doesn't bode well for the Alien Street's frequent shoppers, considering the tacky, overpriced state that Yashow was left in after it made similar changes last year.

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Email: kylemullin@truerun.com
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Photos: Kyle Mullin, echinacities.com