An Electric "Clock" Rules
Aalsmeer's Flower Mart
Fields of blossoms grow almost to the
doors of the market (page 400)a barge
canal leads directly in to the selling floors.
From numbered seats in an amphitheater,
buyers (lower left) inspect blooms pass
ing through on double-banked carts.
An auctioneer high in a gallery rings a
bell to announce each cartload sale. The
clock shows prices; its hand, started at
an unreasonably high figure, moves slowly
toward zero until a bidder stops it by
pressing an electric button. A light flashes
his number on the face of the clock, and
the cartload is his.
This type of auction proceeds in silence.
Each batch of flowers changes hands in a
minute or so. A buyer must move with
split-second speed to win the sale.
Dutch flowers and bulbs, flourishing in
the flat, watery land between Amsterdam
and The Hague, earned $38,000,000 worth
of foreign exchange last year. Most of
the blooms pass through these wholesale
auction rooms at Aalsmeer, 10 miles south
west of Amsterdam.
National Geographic Society
Kodaehromc by Charles Neave
393
