REUTERS/Edgar Su 
 
 BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thai authorities have warned traders not to take advantage of shoppers flocking to buy black shirts to mourn King Bhumibol Adulyadej and have sent out teams of inspectors to scour markets for price gougers. “Regarding black shirts which have become more expensive, the commerce ministry has sent teams to inspect white and black clothing vendors to make sure the shirts are not being sold at prices that are too expensive,” Major General Sansern Kaewkamnerd, a spokesman for the prime minister’s office, told reporters on Saturday. REUTERS/Edgar Su 
 
 Traders said business was brisk and they denied pushing up prices. “Most people are buying black shirts,” said Songkhan Tansonan, running a street stall next to a fetid canal outside Bangkok’s Bobae Market. Slideshow (2 Images) 
 
 She said she had sold 200 black shirts by midday on Saturday and 400 the previous day. “I buy them for 90 baht ($2.60) from the wholesaler and sell them for 120 or 130 baht ($3.40 to $3.70),” she said. Nongrak Bantaotuk, a nurse, said she was buying black shirts for herself and her family. She said prices had risen a bit, but that did not worry her. “If you compare, the price is higher than before, but this isn’t about prices,” she said. “We’re going to wear them for a year.”
– A lot of people in Thailand have apparently discovered that they don't have enough black clothing in their wardrobes for a full year of mourning. Vendors across the country are struggling to cope with a surge in demand for black clothes after the death of King Bhumibol Adulyadej, and government officials have told inspectors to watch out for traders trying to profit from the beloved monarch's death with price-gouging, reports the Bangkok Post, which, like other Thai newspapers and TV stations, is eschewing color images during the mourning period. White is also a traditional color of mourning in the Buddhist country. "Regarding black shirts which have become more expensive, the commerce ministry has sent teams to inspect white and black clothing vendors to make sure the shirts are not being sold at prices that are too expensive," a government spokesman says. A nurse shopping for black clothes in Bangkok tells Reuters that prices have gone up, but that isn't a major concern right now. "If you compare, the price is higher than before, but this isn't about prices," she says. "We're going to wear them for a year."