IT’S hard not to feel sorry for traders inside Queensgate Market.

They are seeing both the number of shoppers declining along with the amount of cash being taken in many of their tills.

And with Tesco getting planning permission to build a large store on Southgate alongside Sainsbury’s, the traders can only see the outlook getting bleaker.

Mason’s sandwich shop has long been popular among office workers and shoppers in the town and that closing is surely a sign of the bad times the market is now facing.

It has to find innovative ways to entice shoppers back through its doors, but that is far easier said than done.

The stallholders face almost impossible competition from the supermarkets and big chains that buy in bulk and sell cheaply.

People’s shopping habits have changed beyond recognition over the last few decades and the feeling is that small shops are disappearing at a faster rate than ever before.

And with most people’s eyes very much on the price of everything from clothes to food to make every penny count, it’s hard not to see more going under.

England used to be known as a nation of shopkeepers.

That has certainly changed and we now seem to be a nation of supermarkets.