Market traders welcome £60m supermarket

The long-awaited store opened yesterday after a 14-year wait, and a spokesman for the Wolverhampton Market Traders Association said the new store will provide a boost to the flagging market.

Dud Malik, from the association, was at the store in Raglan Street for it's opening yesterday, where hundreds of people turned out to get a first look at the new superstore.

Mr Malik said he hoped the store can replicate the fortunes of Bilston Market, where the Morrisons store helped bring trade back to the nearby market.

He said: "We hope that it will have exactly the same effect that Bilston Morrisons did.

"People would go there and do a bit of their shopping and then pop around the market.

"A lot of people who aren't from around this place probably wouldn't normally come to this side of town so the new supermarket will bring them here.

"It's always good to get people to this side of the town."

Mr Malik said he was pleased to see the store open, almost 15 years after the idea had first been mooted.

He added: "We first heard of this about 15 years ago and we have wanted it for all that time.

"There was some sort of dispute between Tesco and Sainsbury's but for now we are just glad that it has been sorted.

"We are really pleased and hope this will bring extra footfall to the market.

"There was a time when there were a few empty stalls but we have already seen a few of those stalls filled thanks to the Sainsbury's."

Hundreds of people descended on the new store, which is being called Sainsbury's St Marks, to have a look inside the second biggest superstore in the Midlands.

But not all of them felt it would be good for the market.

Laurence Davies, from Finchfield, was first in the queue to get into the new store, after arriving at 6am yesterday morning.

The 81-year-old said he feared for the market following the arrival of the superstore.

He said: "I think it will take a certain amount of trade away from the market.

"I think it is good that the store is opening but I think it is bad for the market."

Another shopper who went to the store opening said he felt the wide range at the store would drag people away from the city centre.

Simon Ellis, from Tettenhall, said: "You can buy absolutely everything here and there is free parking, so I think it is terrible news for the city centre. I think it is a nail in the coffin for the city.

"Sainsbury's seem to be doing what Tesco did about five years ago in offering absolutely everything, but I think people will get tired of it."

But store manager Paul Percox said the wide range of items available at the store, such as clothes and electrical goods, is what customers would like about the store.