LUKKELOVEN (2)

The first statistics are out on the economic effect of the liberalisation of the Lukkeloven ("Closing Law"), which took place on 1 October.

Although the changes have only been going for three months, it is clear that the losers are small shops and big supermarkets, and for the same reason; it is simply too expensive to have the necessary extra staff available in the evenings and on Sundays. Labour is ferociously expensive in Denmark; labour at time and a half or double time is simply prohibitive.

It is also clear that the big winners are discount supermarkets, where goods are piled up in cardboard boxes and labour is thin on the ground. Coop has already decided to rebrand 15 of its full-service Super Brugsen stores as Fakta (the discount version). Meanwhile, German-owned Aldi and Lidl, and Norwegian-owned Rema 1000 are all making inroads.

Indeed, discount supermarkets are predicted to represent 45% of the total market by 2020, up from 25% in 2002 and 35% today. Not everybody will like that result, but it does seem inevitable. Once liberalised, retail markets seem to remain that way.

Walter Blotscher