Andrey and Elena Deminska are pleased with the impact their Saturday morning retail offer on Buyer's Walk has had so far - and they'd love to see more traders across New Covent Garden Market join in over time, adding variety and giving customers even more reasons to keep coming back to NCGM for their premium fresh groceries.

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Mercato Battersea runs from 9am to 1pm each Saturday, alongside the units of La Sovrana. For now, much of the range is top-of-the-range Italian produce, and plenty of local and London residents have been making the pilgrimage each week to buy the best of the best. The hope is that, in time, more of the Market's traders might add their own high-quality products to the mix, so there's an even broader choice on the day.

"We've been open for five weekends now," said Andrey. "And the response has been really encouraging. Elena has done a lot of work building the profile, and we didn't expect things to take off like a rocket. We had nearly 100 people there on the first day, and more than 400 have been through since - some of them buying in serious quantity. The concept works. We've been leafletting the area, and now it would be great to see the range grow, so there's even more reason for customers to come back each week."

This is far from a first venture for the couple, who have run their own business for 11 years - including a successful retail store in Bermondsey, with a number of their old customers already making the trip to Nine Elms to see what they're doing next. “Elena brings a further 12 years of running retail at Borough Market, dealing face to face with shoppers - exactly the consumer know-how an offer like this needs,” said Andrey. She's also the founder of the FERMARY kimchi brand, produced in the Market and distributed through the Thorogoods Group.

Andrey is quick to point out that the potential upside isn't only theirs. With Mercato putting real weight behind social media and drawing new footfall to Nine Elms, the attention naturally spreads to the businesses around it. "The more we shine a light on what's here, the more people get to discover these traders," he said. "That can potentially bring fresh interest on the wholesale side too, not just retail - and a trader can pick up that profile without changing a thing about how they work."

He's equally keen to stress there's no pressure on anyone:

"For over 50 years everyone has thought of this purely as a wholesale market, and that idea won't change overnight - we'll melt it down gradually,” he explained. “Any trader who'd like to get involved is very welcome to, in whatever way suits them and we are happy to support. We would like other trader’s support, the door's open for anyone who wants it. As more local people discover what's already here, this can be a real success for the whole Market and the traders.”