Wrexham Markets Scrutiny Committee on Weds + Council Report
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The future of Wrexham’s town centre markets will be discussed on Wednesday at the Council’s Employment, Investment and Business Scrutiny Committee.
There is a fair bit of information in the report (viewable here on the council site via PDF) thus opening this thread for debate and to highlight it.
Three options are presented as possible routes to improve things:
1 – Routine Maintenance and management change
2 – Programme of Investment and improvement
3 – Physical Improvement plus systems ChangeIf you are able to get to the debate its probably worth going as the markets are quite a key aspect of the towns identity and economy!
The meeting begins at 6.15 at Committee Room 3 in the Guildhall and is open to the public.
Also with the PDF there is a large annex down the bottom of the document rather than just the report at the top! :D
This section covers consultations – although the FSB and the Town Centre Forums both have ‘no formal view’.
I have always wondered why there were no food stalls in the People’s Market. I like the Country Market stall and have followed them to different places around the town. The People’s Market is an ideal place for them mainly because they are indoors and warm but also the central location gives buyers easy access to their excellent produce. They are always busy on a Friday and if you don’t get there early you may find they have sold out!
Interesting that the Report is explicitly about the Market sector but implicitly it is about the future of the Independent sector as well. In a town that grew organically, the position before EM was one where a fine balance existed between those shops run by Multiples and those which fed off them in the Independent sector. These were composed of Independent retailers trading in privately rented shops and retailers trading in council rented shops. Both of these groups depended on the footflow provided by their more illustrious Multiple neighbours and shops on King, Lord, Chester and Charles Street (where many Indies are based) depended on the passing trade generated by footflow to the bigger names. The new scenario requires the Council to really help the Markets prosper by every power that it has because if these fail, the surviving Indies will follow suit. That folks is how a town implodes
this is another case of two questionaires with loaded questions to get the response the council staff want.
e.g. the shopper hoppa q. the question should have been how can the service be improved and a secondary question of have you asked your customers about the shopper hoppa bus?
The councillors nor the public are getting a good transparent deal on the info presented in those reports either there are no full results published. Therefore they should be ignored by both as no-one at the meeting will not what context all questions were answered.
Also the report is self defeatist with statements like internet will account for a third of all sales…nothing about sector differences or ways markets could and will counter this.
it’s hard to give any constructive comments at all after reading that report.
i worry for the future of the independent trader with reports like that.
However after briefly looking in the window with all the rent & rates costs for next year, i have only one thing to add. They’re too expensive for a start up in this economic climate. For someone want to make a living from it they are going to need 400 quid a week sales and that’s with an optimistic markup of 200%. So a start up is going to need a big rainy day fund whilst they get established.
Some indoor markets have some day traders and themed days. Local produce, handmade crafts and bric-a-brac for example. Plenty of variety helps to improve footfall in the markets which helps all the traders.
For those who have not read the report all the way through , the town’s indoor markets are NOT under threat. The Council obviously considered all options but have come down firmly on the side of improving our indoor markets and attracting new traders. All of Wrexham indoor markets are open for business !
I maybe in the minority here but having walked through the markets and noticed a lack of traders I think closing one of the sites and relocating the traders to the other 2 sites would be a good idea.
The empty site could then be developed into something. (I don’t know what).@wrexview 3485 wrote:
I have always wondered why there were no food stalls in the People’s Market. I like the Country Market stall and have followed them to different places around the town.
I’ve often wondered if the Country Market sold anything of interest as I’ve never been as I’m in work. Same old problem.
Personally I’d love to see occasional evening markets such as the Victorian one last December which was a huge success. Perhaps a periodic evening economy is a niche that could be exploited more generally.
Priority would have to be an extensive refurbishment of the Central Arcade, butchers and general markets. Wouldn’t it be nice to feel proud when glancing at our heritage..good ideas above…
one of the things that struck me about the report is that it doesn’t list the results/effectiveness of its marketing budget. ideas.
does this mean that there isn’t one?
say if the marketing dept is spending 1k a month in the leader or marcher sound but football and sales aren’t going up, what’s the point in doing it? it’s wastage, especially given the leader’s scandalous negativity of the town. That money could be experimented on other marketing initiatives.
also butchers market… anyone looked up to ceiling? its gorgeous!
@Taffy 3524 wrote:
I maybe in the minority here but having walked through the markets and noticed a lack of traders I think closing one of the sites and relocating the traders to the other 2 sites would be a good idea.
The empty site could then be developed into something. (I don’t know what).The Report deals with this in some detail. The emptiest Market is also the most important in terms of business revenue whilst the most delapidated is architecturally significant. Any contraction of the Markets would impact on those areas they occupy and would damage whatever the brand that Wrexham hopes to develop in the future. The problem is that the 3 Markets generate a lot of cash for the Council. The Report is trying to get the Councillors to actually feed the Golden goose so that it can continue laying
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