There’s something very special about markets.

 

They are cosily intimate, lively, fun and full of atmosphere. As a child, one my school holiday treats was to accompany my mum to the North Yorkshire town of Helmsley for its market on a Friday.

 

They had all sorts on sale, from fruit and vegetables to meat, flowers, clothing and cakes. I particularly liked the stall selling household goods, with balls of string, pan scourers, ‘magic’ dishcloths and things to clean stains from just about everything.

 

I remember buying my mum a plastic towel rail from that stall for her birthday; more than 40 years on, despite its ugliness, it remains on the wall in their kitchen and they still use it.

 

When I lived in London I used to love visiting Chapel Street Market in Islington on a Saturday afternoon and loved listening to the sales patter of stallholders and their banter with shoppers. It used to cheer me up and I would stagger home laden with bags of fruit and veg.

 

The development of out-of-town retail complexes and supermarkets across Britain brought about a change of shopping habits with people less likely to use local markets. Across the country this has seen many markets close and others struggle to survive.

 

They must look for innovative ways to bring in more custom. This month Bradford Council’s markets team is linking with the University of Bradford in a campaign designed to raise the profile of markets across the district through social media, encouraging younger people to check out what markets have to offer.

 

I have tried to bring my daughters up to appreciate local markets. Wherever we go on holiday, I seek them out. In Amsterdam last year I took them to the Albert Cuyp Market, the largest outdoor market in Europe, where you can find almost anything, from tropical fruit to old comics, ethnic jewellery, electronics and more off-then-wall items like cannabis flavoured tea bags. We loved it: at one stall we watched in awe as someone made poffertjes, traditional Dutch pancakes, with yeast and buckwheat flour. They were delicious. At another we bought a delicious apple pie for our tea.

 

The year before we checked out the famous La Bouqueria market in Barcelona, where fruit and vegetables were stacked into precarious-looking pyramids ten feet high.

 

In Norfolk we visited the colourful Norwich Market that has been on its city centre site for 900 years. At six foot four, my husband hated its tightly-packed cosiness, but I adored it. And in Oxford recently, we watched beautiful cakes being iced on a stall in the middle of the lovely covered market.

 

Some markets have massively expanded over the past three decades. When I lived in London Borough Market was very down-at-heel, with just a few traditional fruit and vegetable sellers. My husband and I would go there during our lunch hour and barely see a soul. In the 30 years since then it has changed beyond recognition, and is now an upmarket food destination, with specialist traders selling goods from meat to olives, spices, confectionery and plants. It is also a tourist attraction, driving up prices to beyond my reach. But at least - like many London markets - it is thriving.

 

In the provinces, things are not so easy, and many traders have to work hard to keep afloat. Yet still new markets appear, like Ilkley food market, which opened last year and been a great success.

 

Markets offer bargains. You can haggle and negotiate, you can chat to the owner of the business (something you could never do in Asda or Sainsbury’s) and talk about the produce and where it came from (something you also can’t do in supermarkets).

 

If a market isn’t part of your normal shopping routine, maybe it’s time to change it and discover them for yourself.