Gauges or in-store appointments: suggestions for reopening small businesses

Anger is mounting among traders and some elected officials.

Several mayors of small and medium-sized towns (Perpignan, Brive, Chalon-sur-Saône or Colmar etc.) have issued decrees authorizing the opening of non-food businesses, despite the confinement in force since midnight Thursday.

Anne Hidalgo, PS mayor of Paris, also deplored the closure of local shops and announced a joint initiative in favor of independent bookstores.

All denounce the unfair competition of mass distribution and online sales platforms.

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Philippe Laurent, secretary general of the Association of Mayors of France (AMF) and UDI mayor of Sceaux (Hauts-de-Seine), defends the reopening of local shops.

"We could perfectly match this request to reopen a meeting system, for example, which avoids too much concentration inside the store or even very limited gauges: two to three people at most, depending on the size. of the store ", he confides at the microphone of Europe 1.

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Gauges in supermarkets 

To restore the balance, it would be necessary according to him to apply the same principle in the stores of the large distribution.

"Fairly strict maximum gauges for supermarkets and supermarkets, because this does not currently exist", underlines the secretary general of the AMF.

"What we would lose by opening up small businesses in a reasonable way, we would gain by putting much stricter gauges in supermarkets.

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"This would create a form of equilibrium of competition between these different modes of trade", he concludes.

"This is what we have proposed and I think it is quite reasonable. I hope the government will understand it.