The Barras and its future

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Re: The Barras, Your opinions.

Postby Sydney Rosewater » Tue Jan 22, 2008 1:07 pm

Nick Dooley wrote:Why is it still there in a city centre location even though it offers very little that is authentic?


Could ye expand on that?
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby Dexter St. Clair » Wed Jan 23, 2008 8:43 am

Why is it still there in a city centre location even though it offers very little that is authentic?


Compared to what?
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby Nick Dooley » Fri Jan 25, 2008 8:39 am

Hi there, did'nt notice this thread actually. I'm an interior architecture student and I've been doing alot of research into the Barras recently. The research is for my dissertation which is on the rennaisance of the British market place. The strange thing I've found out about the Barras is that its going against this grain. Whilst other markets are continuing to grow in a time where people are looking for more authenticity from their shopping experience, the Barras is dying. The sad thing is that thier does seem to be certain people who are killing it.
I beleive that the success of the market is now based on what it offers to the experience economy. The answer when it comes to the Barras is history, but it could be so much more. Various interviews with the stall holders has told me that little to know money has been spent on the market and some even beleive that the owners are a waiting for it to fall in order to make a very tidy profit.

I have visited great examples of rejuvinated markets in London. There have great public spaces in adition to retail space available. People gennerally enjoy being there. And this is all because they all offer something auhtentic in the experience on offer.
Don't you guys think the Barras could be great again also?
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby Fossil » Fri Jan 25, 2008 9:52 am

Once the Games/ DVD's/Music CDs/Tobacco guys went (over 3years now) the place died. The police presence didn’t help them either ,those guys brought in hundreds of people a week.
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby conn75 » Fri Jan 25, 2008 10:58 am

As I mentioned earlier I believe that a lot of the stallholders themselves are simply not moving with the times. They are selling a load of stuff that you can now pick up online for a fraction of the price for the comfort of your own home.
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby Nick Dooley » Fri Jan 25, 2008 8:36 pm

that all true, you can get stuff like sports socks in primark foa fraction of the price, from interviewing the stallholders the impression I got from them was not that they weren't moving with the times but that they had no choice. However there is another element to the market place which doesnt exist in the contemporary barras. Yes people like to get a bargin but today people use it more as social space. This is how the barras management can bring the hoards back throught the gates. But my opinion is the they aren't bothered about its future, just in money they will make when its gone. :(
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby excoriate » Fri Jan 25, 2008 8:47 pm

If only Glasgow was like continental Europe, you could wander in and buy amazing quality food grown by semi local people.

I used to go to the barras all the time, not been in about 12 years though.

Do they still have an air rifle / hunting knife stall?
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby Mori » Sun Feb 03, 2008 5:47 pm

Maybe they should think along these lines for a new complex to replace whats there.

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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby onyirtodd » Sun Feb 03, 2008 5:58 pm

That'd be handy. You could nick stuff from the flats and have it on sale in the market in minutes.
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby fourbytwo » Sun Feb 03, 2008 11:12 pm

The potential to revamp the Barras is a great idea.....I went there for a part last week, and what I saw shocked me, as the majority of those circulating were trying to sell fags and tobacco.
Gone has the atmosphere, and the range of 'potential bargains', to be replaced by stalls all selling the same multi-coloured shirts, or denims.
The "upper' element that attracted the money to buy antiques and artefacts are still there, but gone are the patter merchants, gone are the stalls selling the exotic nonsense.
I do really believe that most people who had used the Barras in the past, now happily visit Blochairn each Sunday where the atmosphere of old has been rekindled there.
What to do.....
Well firstly we should ensure that any empty properties are not sold to middle-class owners looking for a thrill, as we see in and around Paddy's Market, the whole area has now moved so up-market that there is very little 'Glesca" there at all, and prices prove that.
Secondly, we should indeed look abroad to see why their open-air markets and associated flea-markets are such an attraction for all, possibily because they have not allowed the architects and planners too much of a say in its future.
Finally, the Council should undertake to get 'attractions' into the city that do not neccessarily cost lots of money, it should be a time when the Council should be spending some of the money it has been creaming-off from the sale of land, to get a return to some older Glesca identity, and like Edinburgh, promote Glasgow's Past.......rather than demolish it..!
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby bluewill » Wed Jul 16, 2008 1:59 pm

hi guys, sorry to bother you. I'm a student, and I'm trying to write something on the Barra's, mainly like a social history, about how the market has changed and what's in store for the future. I've not been back there for a good few years (I don't near Glasgow any more) but I have some incredibly fond memories of wandering round there as a child, particularly some of the "advertising" employed by the traders; I remember signs which said things like "As advertised on TV- Crimewatch UK." I know what you mean though, by the time I was visiting the market towards the end it seemed to be mainly pirated DVD, but there were always guys there selling tobacco come to think of it. I just wondered if anyone on the forum could help me at all. I'd really like to meet anyone who's worked at the market, maybe someone with a few good stories to tell, someone who's seen the market thrive and change, and I suppose eventually decline as is sadly the case at present. Ideally, I suppose, I'd like to meet someone who embodies the changing face of the market, and subsequently a changing Scotland. I'm sorry if this all sounds a wee bit pompous (I am a student after all) but any help would be greatly appreciated. If you do think you could help at all, please don't hesitate to contact me, my email is [email protected].

Thanks a lot guys,

Will
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby fourbytwo » Tue Aug 12, 2008 5:27 pm

Took a recent trip to the Sunday Car Boot Sale at Blachairn,,,,,and there it was, the old Barras as we remember it with some effection, not only were the widest selection goods both new and second hand available....but the stalls where the bargain clothes and shoes were there as well...!
Very disappionted the last time I visited the Barras, as you may have read....now don't see any point in going to the Barras when a wider selection of goods, and at cheaper prices, is available from Blochairn Market, or the Forge Market, both of which remain unaltered by 'goody-goody' planners and officials........
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby fourbytwo » Sun Sep 21, 2008 6:32 pm

:oops: Just a few lines update from my previous comment....
Visited the Barras again yesterday (20/9) and not only was the general services as abmissmal as before, but unfortunately for me, as I was not looking for counterfeit DVD's, there was even less of a reason for me being there.
Surprise, surprise the image of the Barras being the biggest source of counterfeit goods in Europe a few years ago......is now just as big as ever, almost every second stall had 'hundreds and hundreds' of pirate DVDs and the alternate stalls had bundles of fake tops and designer fake perfumes.....
Probably the 'trade' has increased again because of the 'police actions' at Paddy's that are the flavour of the month, however, Paddy's never in my lifetime has ever openly sold such volumes of goods as the Barras....so we have a dilema....
Are we to now believe that these 'criminal statistics' taken around Paddy's to support closure, could in fact contain figures from the Barras, (which is in the same Police catchment), certainly from what i saw, there seems to be a dearth of police activity at the Barras now, allowing the pirates to operate in big numbers....
Maybe the pirateers are buying property at the Barras, so that they can keep the riff-raff away from their doors, NIMBY..?
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby hazy » Mon Sep 22, 2008 3:10 pm

Unfortunatly the Barras will never be what it was no mater how much money you throw at it. Regarding counterfeit goods ,well its just asign of the times .The Hippy market in Ibezia or Canal Street in New York they too were famous markets but same as the Barras they are now full of counterfeit goods. Its a world thing and not exclusive to the Barras as some people like to make out.
Thank you. And why not.
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Re: The Barras and its future

Postby robertpool » Thu Nov 27, 2008 12:23 am

Receipts from my days as a 'Barras' trader. The first receipt is rent charges for weekend trading and second is storage charges

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