Page 10 - MarketTimesAugust2013
P. 10

  NEWS
Market Times • August 2013
    Love Your Local Market campaign a huge success
 LOVE Your Local Market 2013 was an outstanding success, says its organiser, the National Association of British Market Authorities.
The campaign, which took place over a May fortnight, was launched at the famous Portobello Road market in London by two Government ministers, and ended at
the equally famous Borough market in Southwark in a short ceremony attended by a baroness, no less.
In between it has been estimated that nearly 3,500 events took place during the fortnight, with 26 per cent of the 696 UK markets that registered to take part holding events throughout the entire period.
This compares favourably with the 500 markets that registered for the first LYLM campaign last year.
Nearly all of the 3,500 pitches offered on a sliding scale from free to £10 — the Stalls for a Tenner scheme suggested by shopping guru Mary Portas — were taken up.
Government Communities Minister Don Foster and Markets Minister Mark Prisk spent a lot of time chatting to traders at Portobello Road, both start-ups and long- timers such as James and Cheryl Devlin, pictured with National Market Traders Federation Chief Executive Joe Harrison.
Don Foster is pictured on our front page, entering into the spirit of the occasion with new trader Remaro Hibbert, one of the Market Enterprise Launch Pad winners in an initiative by local authority market operator, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
At the closing ceremony in the Borough market its managing director Keith Davis welcomed
Baroness Hanham, a minister in the Department for Communities and Local Government, who spoke about what a success the campaign had been.
And after that success NABMA has announced that Love Your Local Market will be back in 2014.
Perhaps the last word on Love Your Local Market has to go to Cheryl Devlin who runs the Portobello Road fruit and veg stall started by her great grandparents.
At the launch of the initiative, Cheryl said: “This market is my life. I started here selling five lemons for a shilling when I was six or seven. It’s my community. It’s my family. It was thriving in the 1960s and 1970s through to the 1990s, but now there are more tourists than shoppers. It gets harder and my expenses get higher and the takings lower. But it’s a way of life and I think markets should go on for ever because they are all about the community and what really matters.”
 Borough managing director Keith Davis and Baroness Hanham
  An attractive market barrow wheeled out for the LYLM launch
Baroness Hanham (centre) pictured with NABMA President Geraldine Carter and Borough Trustees Vice-Chair David Lyon
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