NRW wants to extend hours on Saturdays Shopping until midnight

BONN · On weekdays, many Bonn supermarkets are open until midnight. If the NRW state government has its way, this would also be extended to include Saturdays. Here’s a look at the mood in Bonn when it comes to extended shopping hours.

Nowadays, it is possible to shop right around the clock. With online shopping, closing time is history. And in the real world, the CDU government of North Rhine-Westphalia also wants to extend shopping hours for Saturdays - until midnight. But the easing of restrictions on shopping hours is met with criticism by the opposition parties, the SPD and the Greens. The union Verdi also opposes an extension of shopping hours. In other countries, such as the U.S., opening hours around the clock have long been standard.

By law, there are no time restrictions in NRW for weekdays Monday to Friday - during the week, shops can be open 24 hours if they want. But on Saturday, the mandatory closing time is 10pm. For Verdi, that already represented a serious compromise, and the Protestant Church has also rejected an extension of shopping hours on Saturdays and Sundays.

But how do the people of Bonn see it? Is there any need for shopping here until midnight? In Bonn, more than two dozen supermarkets are open until 10 pm, six of them even until midnight on weekdays. A few years ago, things looked very different. At that time,the city center lacked supermarkets. Bonn residents could buy groceries in the fine foods section of the Kaufhof department store. Today, there are various offers in the city - from the organic supermarket to the discounter to the full-range retailer. Most recently, a "Rewe to go" branch opened in Wenzelgasse. Here customers receive a stripped-down version of the normal range of products as well as small prepared dishes seven days a week - albeit at a significantly higher price than in normal branches of the chain.

It is 9pm in the town center of Beuel. Around the town hall, several supermarkets are open until 8pm, some close at 9pm, others at 10pm. Compared to the city center, however, the aisles of these grocery stores are emptier and the shelves are fuller. Employees use the time to restock shelves. Here, customers tend to make smaller purchases. A man is packing his purchases into a paper bag. "I often use the offer of long opening hours," he says. Especially as a professional, you can still go shopping in the evenings. Another shopper agrees. One of the customers says he commutes daily between Beuel and Düsseldorf. He only has the evening to make necessary purchases. "I used to live in Kessenich, the supermarket was even open until midnight," he says.

At 9pm in a Rewe market in the city center, there are three hours until closing time and still a lot of activity in the store. But only a few are doing their weekly shopping. The predominantly young customers tend to buy products for a late dinner. Sushi, ready-made salads or bread from the baked goods shelves are added to the shopping cart. Others put bags of chips, beer bottles or a bottle of red wine on the grocery belt. Similar shopping scenes take place in other parts of the city or in Bad Godesberg city center at this time of day. But not all customers approve of nighttime shopping. "I do not think this is good," says a woman leaving the supermarket. "Employees should be able to go to their families in the evenings as early as possible."

The laws governing shopping hours only provide the framework of when stores are allowed to be open. Individual businesses can determine their own opening hours within this framework. While large supermarket chains like Aldi set a uniform opening time for all of their branches, in most other supermarket chains the times differ from market to market. At Edeka, too, the decision lies with the respective independent market operators: "The merchants decide independently on their opening hours and are guided solely by local market and competitive conditions," says Gerd Koslowski, spokesman for the Edeka trading company Rhein-Ruhr.

Adalbert von der Osten, chief executive of the retail association Bonn -Rhein-Sieg-Euskirchen says it’a about whether or not longer hours are reflected in sales. Longer opening hours do not necessarily mean increased sales - at least in some industries. For fashion stores, longer shopping times could contribute to a more relaxed shopping atmosphere that encourages shoppers to buy. But that can not be generalized. "It's always a question of balance," says von der Osten.

Many businesses have long decided against extending opening hours. "It's not worth it here," says Mechthild Meyer, an employee of Ludus, a toy store on Friedrichstrasse. For Christmas, they had tried longer opening hours, but went back to 7pm again last year. Because longer opening hours mean higher costs for electricity, heating and staff. And so retailers in Bonn city center close between 7 and 8pm, Saturdays also earlier.

Orig. text: Sabrina Bauer, Translation: ck

Meistgelesen
Neueste Artikel
Zum Thema
Aus dem Ressort