9:50am Friday 12th March 2010
By Tom Moseley
TRADERS have been told they will need to be ‘neatly dressed and well presented’ to be considered for a place in Blackburn’s new market.
Council bosses have unveiled full details of their vision of the ‘continental-style’ market which will replace the current Ainsworth Street site.
In official information packs to traders, they urge traders to ‘create a sense of theatre’, for example by using displays of live lobsters on food stalls.
But stallholders say the plans, which include rent increases of up to 60per cent, are unrealistic and will not work in Blackburn.
Last week they were served with formal notices to quit the current site.
Market traders’ chairman Chris Appleby questioned the plans for more than 60 fresh food stalls at the new £8million, six-day complex on the ground floor of the new Mall shopping centre.
“On paper the plans look amazing, but where will the demand for its services come from?” he said.
The information pack, which includes an application form to be considered for a place, includes pictures of mainly food-based stalls, including fish, fresh raspberries, duck eggs and bread.
Suggesting ways to display products, it added: “Fittings which create a sense of theatre will be encouraged eg ‘viveur’-type displays of live lobsters on a shellfish stall, or rotating glass display cases on a giftware stall.”
And the ‘management regulations’ on the new market’s website state: “Stallholders shall be neatly dressed and well presented.”
Mr Appleby said: “A market down in London might have live lobsters.
"I can only wonder what the market for them is like around here.”
The council’s Tory regeneration chief Alan Cottam said he was confident the market would prove a success by competing with supermarkets on low-price items.
He added: “Obviously not every stall will have a live lobster, but that is the sort of thing you get on a continental market, which is what we are aiming for.”
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