Following on from our recent article about the old Celtic Clubcall line, we felt it would be interesting to take a look at the ongoing Celtic tradition of street trading, and cast our eye back to the days of terrace traders.
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The advent of the internet, satellite TV, social media and fan media confined club calls to the past. The roles are somewhat reversed in terms of terrace traders, where enhanced professionalism and commercial expertise have put a stop to that practise, though the tradition of street sellers remains.
Times may have changed at Celtic Park as the retail wing of the club sells limitless stock from books and DVDs to umbrellas and jumpers emblazoned with a Celtic crest. Celtic have a superstore, an online shop and numerous stores dotted around Scotland and Ireland. However, unofficial Celtic merchandise continues to be sold by fans online and through the street traders surrounding Paradise and walking into Celtic pubs before home games. Some even travel abroad and sell scarves, badges and flags to our European away support.
That tradition has been in place for many years as, until Fergus McCann arrived in the mid-90s, Celtic weren’t very commercially aware when it came to selling merchandise. A gap in the market existed and street traders emerged to fill the void.
When the tradition began en masse in the late 1950s, it was simply a range of badges, flags, rosettes and scarves on offer. However, the 1980s saw t-shirts, scarves and flags adorned with slogans and humorous digs of the nature that official sources would never touch. The 1990s also saw t-shirts used to protest against the old board.
The first Celtic fanzine was called The Shamrock and it preceded the Celtic View. It was the first of its kind in world football. However, by the 1980s the fanzine scene grew at Celtic and then exploded in the 1990s/2000s as we had become accustomed to seeing Not The View, The Alternative View, TAL, More Than 90 Minutes, Once A Tim, The Shamrock (new version), The Thunder and others. Street traders assisted in the sales of these publications and started adding other magazines, collectables, books, DVDs and rebel tapes to their stock.
There was even one street vendor who turned to busking until he was rumbled. Indeed, the singer was spotted outside Celtic Park singing rebel songs, but it later became known that he would sing Loyalist anthems outside Ibrox at Rangers home games and as such he was playing both supports! Nevertheless, other buskers can be seen at Paradise from time to time, including one gentleman who sings a fantastic rendition of Willie Maley behind the Jock Stein Stand at full time.
The tradition of selling unofficial merchandise continues both outside Paradise and abroad today. It is often a place that fans can buy political or humorous items, which cannot be sold in official outlets.
Beyond the street sales, which continue to this day, there was another tradition at Paradise which has gone. That was the tradition of the terrace trader. All seated stadia put a stop to that in 1994 and the re-developed Celtic Park installed pie stands, hot food and beverages etc. However, up until that point fans used to walk around the old terracing with large boards covered in badges. They also sold sweets, tablet and most famously of all Macaroon Bars and Spearmint Chewing Gum!
One story from a game in the 80s tells of a terrace trader walking through the Jungle. The famous shout went up “Any Macaroon bars, c’mon you barstewards buy a macaroon bar, ‘eres the chewing gum…” At that point a fan tripped him and as he fell, people piled in to pick up his stock for themselves like a hungry pack of wolves. He turned away shaking his head giving the v-sign to supporters!
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