The biggest winners of Finland's new deregulated shop opening hours appear to be large retailers.
For the period from January to May, large supermarket sales grew by 6 percent over the same time period a year ago, according to the Federation of Finnish Commerce.
The Federation also reports that the number of employees in the retail sector increased by 2,500 from January to June compared with same time the previous year, which represents a 1.5 percent increase year-on-year.
Smaller shops suffer
At the same time, smaller independently-owned shops saw their sales for January to May drop by 12.7 percent compared with the same time a year earlier.
"Previously, smaller, independent shops and kiosks benefited from the regulation of shop opening hours. Now, their work has decreased and the number of workers and extra hours have increased in larger supermarkets,” says Jaana Kurjenoja, head economist for the Federation of Finnish Commerce.
For the 2,500 new employees in the retail sector, the Federation’s press release does not stipulate how many of the new jobs are part-time or full-time.
The Federation is forecasting retail sales to increase by about 1 percent this year. In addition to the deregulated opening hours, growth will be supported by an increase in consumer purchasing power, it says.
In 2015 the retail sector employed about 162, 000 people.