Examined in the article is the methodological role of the “political market” metaphor in modern political studies. The concept of “political market” is considered as such a system-forming metaphor of the modern political-science discourse, which serves as foundation for extrapolating the experience of examination of commercial markets onto the plane of political analysis. In the first part of the article are considered general theoretico-methodological questions of typologizing and of discovering the substance potential of the “political market” metaphor. In the second part the authors’ attention is concentrated on methodological questions of metaphoric simulation of party design, of political franchising and on other categories derivative from the “political market” concept.