Page 42 - MarketTimesAugust2014
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bedding and towels with his partner, Christina Mathers, for the past 23 years, says he may decide to pull the plug on standing Ripon market to concentrate on Beverley Market and the internet side of his business which has taken off.
Stephen said: “I have stood this market for the past seven years. It has been affected by changes in shopping habits and the recession. People have got used to buying just the necessities. And internet shopping is the big one.”
But Stephen says the retail offering in Ripon lets the market down. “There are so many charity shops, and they change people’s attitudes to shopping. People search the charity shops, not the market, for a bargain.”
There are cafes, fish and chip shops, empty shops, but not much of anything to make people want to make a day of shopping in
Ripon, he says.
Brian Murphy, who is the fourth generation
to run the fruit and veg business established by his great-grandfather 95 years ago, agrees.
“We do really well because we have been here so long and have so many regular customers,” says Brian. “It should be the perfect set up, with a tradition among local people and those in outlying villages shopping on the market every Thursday. But the shops are all cheap shops.”
Alan Carby, who travels from Boston in Lincolnshire and has one of the busiest stalls selling plants and flowers, has no complaints about his trade, but sees that some traders are struggling.
“I started here in 1969,” said Alan, who is 70 and has no plans to retire. He decided to take the plunge and start his own business, although his father and grandfather had worked for other
people in the nursery business.
“I had my own nursery and wanted to sell on
markets, but in those days there were queues to get onto markets and all the ones in Lincolnshire were full,” he said.
Alan decided to look northward because he reckoned that he would be the first to be selling the different plants because they would bloom earlier further south.
“All that’s changed, with so many imported plants, but I still do very well here,” he added.
He puts the market’s problems down to changing shopping habits. “It’s Martini shopping these days - any time, anywhere, any place,” he said.
Traders who pack up early on bad days, or don’t turn up at all, don’t help the market, Alan said.
And bad weather over recent years has taken its toll. Ripon market sometimes has to be
  and veg business on Ripon market that was started by his great- At 70, Allan Carby is one of Ripon’s longest serving market traders. grandfather 95 years ago
He travels from Boston in Lincolnshire to sell the plants he grows at his nursery
Sonya Johnson has chosen an outside life selling scarves and jewellery on Ripon market Richard Bell has been selling sweets on the
after many years working as a croupier in a casino
Brian Murphy is the fourth generation of his family to run the fruit
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market for the past 15 years










































































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