Given their limited financial resources, shoppers generally appreciate the practical necessities of resisting sales pitches and other promotional activities destined to entice them into inopportune purchases. At the same time, ventures into the marketplace represent practical necessities for nearly everyone as well as significant forms of entertainment (Prus and Dawson, 1991;Prus, 1993Denoting a setting in which people may realize new aspects of self (by acquiring new possessions) and face the prospects of losing existing aspects of self (by foregoing the objects one offers in exchange), 1 the marketplace represents an arena in which considerable human drama unfolds. The marketplace brings people together by virtue of its potential for exchange, but the accomplishment of exchange remains a matter of considerable ambiguity and human enterprise. 2 Thus, as in other realms of human interaction, the marketplace signifies an arena in which people may assume a variety of perspectives, interests and strategies in their dealings with others.