More potential stallholders have come forward to expand Halstead's Saturday market.

From March, six additional stalls selling cheese, pie, jam, honey, and crafts, plus an ice cream man, will join existing traders on Market Hill on the third Saturday of every month.

Mike Prince, of the Halstead Town Team, said: “We have had quite a lot of responses after the article last week.

“I don’t want to say too much at the moment but one is an established stall holder and one is a Colchester-based business interested in having a market presence.”

Mr Prince said he was in the process of contacting even more traders to gauge their interest.

Organisers have also said they will offer start-up businesses a discount and allow them to use pop-up stalls owned by Braintree Council.

Mr Prince said: “I have had emails from some of the retailers in the shops and they are in agreement with the market being better, although we don’t want to take trade away from existing shops.

“Generally speaking everyone I have spoken to has been supportive and we are getting there.”