Infectious Entrepreneurship

I have a new idea for a business school… Just spend a year interning in the Souks of Marrakech and you’ll get all the sales, accounting, negotiation, cultural, organizational and bartering skills you could ever want. Sure, you’ll start at the bottom initially, like all interns… Instead of making copies, you’ll be schlepping mint tea; rather than taking accounting, you’ll be a runner to get change, leaving your customers for a good 20 minutes before returning, and then slowly counting it out coin by coin hoping the customer will call it good before you give the right change back; in lieu of marketing, you’ll be taught how to intercept anyone who may have a wallet and berate them until they relinquish some amount for any good, service or photo… there’s an infinite amount of coursework for the motivated student!

Unlike any city I have been to, Marrakech is loaded with thousands of entrepreneurs, offering a dizzying array of goods that blend into a commercial tapestry of wonder. Every style of salesmanship is on display, sampled each day that we wind our way through the ancient streets, souks and markets. Communication and presentation skills are essential, and the Moroccans can do this in a plethora of languages. French, English, Japanese, Italian, Bereber, Arabic, German… it seems that everyone in this country can converses with almost anyone in the world. And communicate they do!

“Barack Obama! Yes We Can!”

“Hello! Hello! Hello! Hello! Hello!”

“Hey China, Japan, Kenichiwa, Nihau!”

“Cookies, hey Bieber! Cookies, hey Bieber!”

“Good price. You want? Good price!”

It can be pretty disorientating, but also part of the down-the-rabbit-hole experience that is Marrakech. Our favorite business strategy we found in the city, which was fairly rare, was to put actual prices on the merchandise, and let the consumer just shop… It’s a radical approach for sure, but one that seemed to yield the best response from us, at least!