What Are QVM's Greatest Challenges?

There are so many issues associated with renewal that keeping track of what deserves to be at the top of the list is not easy. But here is a view from one of our traders along with an invitation for all traders to contribute their thoughts.

"With todays current economic climate, what do you see as the biggest challenges for the QVM going forward?

 After many hours of thought, l have realised that our great QVM will have many challenges, some of them will be big, some small, but if we all work together and look at the bigger picture, we can ensure the survival of our great market, not just for the next 5 years, but for the next 100 years.

 My personal feelings of our greatest challenges are as follows:

1. Customers are time poor

• In todays modern day society, we are all working longer hours, population growth is spreading further and further out (look at me, I live in Wallan), and this means that customers have less time to spend travelling to shopping destinations.

2. Higher costs of living

• With the price of utilities increasing, petrol, tolls and parking (City of Melbourne adding a Congestion Tax to all parking spaces to reduce the number of cars travelling to the city) these will all contribute to customers looking at the overall cost of the day to the market, versus a visit to the new local shopping that has been built in the estate just up the road from them, selling items at around the same prices as the market.

3. Hours of operation

• Our current hours of operation do not reflect todays modern day shopper whether they be local, interstate tourist or international traveller. The City of Melbourne now advertises that they are open until 7pm every night. With our current hours of operation, we miss out on the potential for all the locals (approx. 1,000,000 people and growing – we have several high rise apartment blocks currently under construction, plus the 5 or 6 that are due to start in the near future).

• We are currently in a Buyers market, where they can dictate to us, if they will shop with us, or they will shop elsewhere as there is now so many options available 24 hours a day.

4. Weather

•   I feel that with our market being exposed to all the elements, this is hurting our trade in these harder economic times. If we could improve the protection around the market, and reduce the strong winds and rain from getting into the sheds, it would provide a better experience for all. We also need to provide some protection at the Queen Street ATMs, so customers do not need to queue up in the rain."

- Lance Dyer.

 Have Your Say - click here.