Record price for new year stall
The auction for stalls at the Victoria Park Lunar New Year fair saw the highest bid in 10 years for the largest fast-food stall at the five-day event, but two smaller ones went for less than last year.
A snack seller who gave his name as Mr Lau paid HK$510,000 for the stall and will need to earn more than HK$100,000 a day to make a profit. The stall, measuring 7.6 metres by 4.8 metres and next to Sugar Street, went for HK$380,000 last year. The previous highest price for this stall was HK$490,000 two years ago.
All the stalls saw a higher opening price, which for the first time was calculated by the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department by taking last year's opening price and adding the rise in the Consumer Price Index A from last year, or 5.1 per cent.
Ho Leung-shing, senior superintendent of operations at the department, said the increase in the opening price usually had no effect on the selling price.
A total of 600 people attended the auction, which saw occasional shouting and bickering between bidders battling for the corner stalls.
There were 177 wet-goods stalls up for bidding yesterday, of which 165 were auctioned off. The highest selling price was HK$48,300. Last year the highest selling price for a wet-goods stall was HK$45,000. Fifty-one of them were sold at the opening price of HK$8,410.
The total raised from sales of wet food stalls was around HK$300,000 less than last year.
The fair will take place from January 17 to January 21. The early arrival of the Lunar New Year is a headache for flower farmers. Last year's fair ran from January 28 to February 3.
A major concern is the chilly weather forecast by the Observatory.
Lau Hoi-to, also known as the 'Peach Flower King, said: 'Our peach blossoms may not open in time. The fair is only around 70 days away and the flowers are still little buds.
'The cold weather is a concern, but that's not even the worst part. It's going to be terrible for our business if it rains. And you know, we sing in folk songs about spring showers making the flowers bloom, so we need the showers. But it's a headache if the fair is on at the same time as the spring showers.'
Lau rented 15 stalls this year for around HK$200,000, which he said was less than he had paid in the past. Last year he rented 13 stalls in the same area for around HK$300,000.
'People might have more of an incentive to buy peach blossoms to put at home to turn their fortunes around,' Lau said.
Yeung Siu-lung, who is known as the 'Orchid King' and has taken part in the fair for more than a decade, bought 14 stalls for around HK$150,000.
He said the cold weather would be a wallet pincher for him because he would have to turn up the greenhouse heat for his orchids.
The bidding continues today at the Queen Elizabeth Stadium in Wan Chai, with 284 dry-good stalls and eight thematic stalls up for grabs.
2,004
The total number of stalls up for auction at this year's fair
- HK$290,310 was the opening price for fast-food stalls
