By Ashley Ahn
Name-checked by Nipsey Hussle and other rappers — “This is how we ball … Slauson Mall” — the hulking green warehouse-like building is a place to get a suit and tie, 7-inch platform shoes, wigs, bejeweled tooth decorations or a custom R.I.P. shirt to commemorate a deceased loved one. It’s often called a swap meet, but the stalls are like small stores, with permanent walls and shelves, where a customer can not only dress and accessorize head to toe but also get a manicure and a tattoo, haggling over prices to get a good deal. The food court sells fried Cajun-style chicken, pupusas and Korean tofu stew.
The Korean merchants weathered a boycott in 1990 over allegations that they were rude to Black customers, staved off looters during the 1992 riots and survived the COVID-19 pandemic by setting up in the parking lot.
Now, many are approaching retirement, with the swap meet in decline as customers migrate to the internet. The long hours at their stalls paid for their children’s college educations — by design, the next generation won’t be taking over. New vendors, including some Latinos who were employees and then started businesses of their own, are trying their luck.
In South Korea, Timothy Jeong imported livestock for Korean Airlines. After he arrived in the U.S. in 1983, his path was shaped by his connections with other immigrants. He got into the swap meet business through a friend.
“Your life is determined by who picks you up at the airport, who you know,” said Jeong, 75.
In 1988, he opened a 200-square-foot clothing stall at Slauson Super Mall, gradually expanding to 4,000 square feet. The scale allows him to turn a profit, he said — if only a tenth of what he made during the swap meet’s heyday — despite the challenges of selling retail clothing in an internet economy.
Read more at: LA Times