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A FRENCH WAR OVER 'DAY OF THE LORD'

PARIS June 22, 2006 (IHT) - Louis Vuitton was certain it had found an ingenious way around the French ban on doing business on Sunday: It called its new flagship store on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées a cultural center.

Cultural centers are exempt from the Sunday law. Alas, where LVMH saw a lavish spectacle of French culture, the French Christian Labor Union [scil., Confédération Française des Travailleurs Chrétiens, CFTC] and the National Clothing Federation [Fédération Nationale de l'Habillement, FNH] saw cruel exploitation of the French worker.

Accusing the luxury goods giant of violating workers' rights to leisure time, the two groups won a lawsuit last month to shut down the Sunday operations, even though none of the store's employees belong to the union.

The country's hundred-year-old labor law limiting Sunday work has been amended and eroded, interpreted and flouted to such an extent over the years that it makes little sense. Proprietors who provide "urgent" economic needs, including restaurants, bars, tobacco shops, newspaper kiosks, florists and pharmacies are not bound by the ban. Retailers who can prove an "athletic, recreational or cultural" side to their businesses in "touristic" zones in cities throughout the country, including six neighborhoods in Paris, can be exempted, depending on rulings by the local prefect. So can retailers in depressed economic areas who can make the case that they might go bankrupt if they cannot open on Sunday. Food markets and many food stores can open - but only on Sunday mornings. Bakeries can stay open all day Sunday, as long as they close another day of the week to allow their "artisans" to rest. Reflecting the changing patterns of French family life, the labor law was amended to allow gardening and home-improvement centers, DVD and video rental stores and Internet service shops to operate on Sundays.

A one-page ad by the Usines Center last week in the newspaper Le Figaro branded the law incomprehensible "in a country that counts more than 2,500,000 unemployed at the moment and where the prime minister and his government declare creating jobs their priority."

The Virgin Megastore on the Champs-Élysées, which provides "urgent" DVDs, CDs, and books, flouted the Sunday law nearly two decades ago and was fined. Over the years flouts and fines continued, Virgin effectively paying for the privilege of voiding the law.

"They told us we'd pay fines, but we did it anyway," said Jean-Noël Reinhardt, president of Virgin Stores. "We were absolutely not allowed to be open, but we did it. It started a debate in France and after many years, the law was changed. There's a kind of hypocrisy here - everyone knows the law doesn't correspond to the needs and desires of the consumer."

An Ipsos telephone survey published in April indicated that 75 percent of those polled said they approved of stores opening on Sundays. But for the opponents of working Sundays, nothing less than the French way of life is at stake.

"Maybe I'm the last dinosaur in France*, but if we continue like this, we'll end up with no neighborhood merchants," said Charles Melcer, president of the clothing federation. "We'll end up with those huge malls that Americans adore. We have to be vigilant."

Ah, the Americans! France, remain ever vigilant!

But then he argued his case on more mundane grounds. "Why should merchants who respect the law and stay closed be punished?" he asked. "And why should those who flout the law profit?"

But M. Mercer is not arguing for parity in law. He is arguing the case for merchants who enjoy an advantage in the law. Abolishing the law would put the decision equally before all French merchants. In which case only the enterprising and industrious would profit.

* Oh-ho, M. Mercer, hardly the last. There are these and these. France is replete with dinosaurs

PFFT (What is this?): Retailing culture 5 | Discounting culture 5 | Rayonnement français 0