"It's fun and friendly and full of people"

“The markets create a great atmosphere. It's fun and friendly and full of people. It suits the product. It really does bring a lot of Christmas cheer to the city centre.

“There has been no sense of recession this year. It's only really the weather that affects sales. When the weather's bad it's quieter, when the weather good it's busy. That's the reason why we don't gamble with other markets.

“There is no one big seller. We do over 120 different puppets and they are all big sellers. The young boys tend to want to buy the dinosaur puppets though. All the parts are cut and designed in Coventry, and then the puppets are manufactured in the Far East.

“There just aren't enough outlets for puppets. Shops generally only want to sell one or two types. They just don't sell enough to justify having a range. Our puppets are available online for the rest of the year when we aren't here.

“We sell a lot to the police force and children's protection departments. When children have been abused or badly treated, it's often easier to get them to talk to a puppet rather than talk to an officer. Language departments also use the puppets to teach people how to do sign language.

“Manchester people are very good – they will have a laugh with you, they are happy for you to demonstrate something. They really like to talk. When they are at the Christmas markets, they have a couple of gluhweins and they are in a very good mood.”

www.aspuppets.co.uk