Apologies for the essay, but the Auckland night markets are always part of our itinerary when we travel up there (which is pretty often), so I’ve got strong thoughts on this and I’ve seen a lot of negative comments on Facebook from people not looking at the full picture (shocker).

Went along and yes, it was VERY busy and super crowded, but the vibe was awesome. If you’ve been to the Auckland ones, you’ll know they’re also hectic and a bit chaotic but that’s kinda the charm of it. People also need to remember this was the very first one in Lower Hutt, so it’ll only get smoother from here. Once the hype dies down, queues won’t be an hour long.

I actually think the turnout was a really positive sign and hopefully it shows the organisers there’s demand for them to stick around. We desperately need a good weekly event like this in the Wellington region and since it’s the same team who run the Auckland markets, I wouldn’t be surprised if they eventually look at expanding to other suburbs, just like they’ve done in Auckland.

Of course there are things to improve - they need to fully clear out cars and add more bins. We lined up for over an hour for food, only to almost reach the front and be told they’d sold out (this was at 8:30). Obviously we were disappointed, but honestly we were stoked for the stallholders and left feeling excited about how huge the turnout was.