The ban on Sunday shopping, promised in the election platform of the HDZ-led government, went into force on 1 July but as time goes by, there are more and more estimates that it has been detrimental to small retailers while those exempt from the ban make additional profit.

Since the ban went into force in the middle of the tourist season, coastal towns are using the quota of 16 Sundays when Sunday shopping is allowed while most shops in the country’s interior do not work on Sundays.

The shops that owing to their location are exempt from the ban – such as shops within railway stations – have become the most frequented places on Sundays and holidays, with people waiting in lines to do shopping.

Petrol stations, another exemption from the ban, have started expanding the range of goods they sell to include bread, while bakeries are closed.

At the same time, there is a growing will to resort, in addition to the possibility for shops to work 16 Sundays in a year, which is mostly used in the coastal region, to additional legal exceptions.

After the weekend of August 5-6, when Sunday was preceded by a public holiday, many municipalities and towns have declared 15 August, the Feast of the Assumption, a fair day in order to enable trading.

The tourist resorts of Hvar, Baška, Crikvenica, Pula and Split were the first to do so, followed by Zagreb and Varaždin, cities in the country’s interior.

Most of them have also declared all the other Sundays in August and September fair days.

HUP: Constitutional complaint and ban suspension

To the many opponents of the Sunday shopping ban, these developments are what its implementation boils down to.

This is the third legal ban on Sunday shopping, with the previous two having been overturned by the Constitutional Court.

Shortly after its introduction, the Voice of Entrepreneurs Association (UGP) filed a motion to check the constitutionality of the new Trade Act, and the Croatian Employers Association (HUP) plans to do the same.

HUP will submit a motion for a constitutionality test after it obtains real financial data on trade during this year’s summer months.

“We will propose that the Constitutional Court suspend the Sunday shopping ban to protect small, family-run shops, which are the most vulnerable group,” HUP said.

It estimates that in the first week of August, due to two public holidays, the real turnover in smaller retail chains and shops decreased by 15%.

UGP leader Hrvoje Bujas claims small retailers who are UGP members have seen a decrease in turnover of as much as 30%.

HUP says that “an additional blow to retail chains is expected next year, when the 16 working Sundays will have to be distributed throughout the year and not just six months.”

Petrol stations have long been selling consumer goods

The two associations point to another negative effect of the law – unfair competition.

However, the Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK) Retail Sector says one should not rush to conclusions and that it does not see a direct link between the sudden expansion of the product range of retailers exempt from the Sunday shopping ban and the ban itself.

“Specifically, petrol stations have been selling consumer goods for a longer period of time,” the HGK says, reinforcing its claim about the ban not being related to petrol stations now also selling bread, spreads and milk, by recalling that not so long ago, during the COVID-19 lockdown, people were buying coffee at petrol stations.

Not clear who can sell goods during fair days

Several dozen towns in Croatia have declared special events and fair days for the coming Feast of the Assumption as well as for the subsequent Sundays, but it is not entirely clear which goods it will be possible to sell at those events.

The Economy Ministry has only said that the provision on occasional sales “allows only the sale of products and goods that are the object of the said sales and because of which those events are organised.”

As for the question if a tobacco shop can be open for the Feast of the Assumption, for example in Crikvenica, which has declared 15 August a fair day, the ministry did not provide an answer.

The ministry also underscores that declaring fair days is not a loophole but a legal possibility all towns can use.

The government said the reason for the introduction of the Sunday shopping ban was to balance family life and work, with sociologist Jasminka Lažnjak of the Zagreb Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences saying that it is difficult to say if the ban is beneficial or detrimental.

“Bans of this kind elicit legitimate questions by different interest groups, which in this case are mostly against the ban,” she says.

From the economic point of view, it is evident that the ban, according to claims by the liberal sector, restricts consumers’ rights as well as the possibility to make profit and freedom of enterprise, of, for example, a kiosk owner who works in that kiosk alone.

Emphasis on traditional values, as well as concession to the Church

If one looks at the social values that are imposed with the ban, it is beyond question that the ban is an attempt to underline traditional values, with Sunday traditionally being the day of rest in Croatian society, Lažnjak says but notes that there is constant pressure from social stakeholders, in this case the Church, to declare Sunday a non-working day because it considers it a holy day.

“This is definitely a concession to the Church,” Lažnjak says, noting that the pressure from the Church is an attempt to stop secular trends in the Croatian society, which, she believes, will not be successful.

The ban is also an evident attempt to meet demands from advocates of workers’ rights, particularly as there are big discrepancies with regard to respect for those rights in the private and the public sector.

Effect of ban on workers’ rights will not be spectacular

The national union of workers in the retail sector says that shop workers are satisfied with the ban.

“Implementation of new rules requires adaptation by all stakeholders, in this case citizens and employers,” union leader Zlatica Štulić said.

She believes that the ban is a positive change that citizens will get used to, and that turnover will be redistributed.

Despite union support for the Sunday shopping ban, Teo Matković of the Zagreb Institute for Social Research believes the Sunday shopping ban will not have a significant effect with regard to the improvement of workers’ rights.

In the past 15 years, which is how long research of this type has been conducted, approximately one-third of workers in Croatia worked at least on one Sunday in a month. In that regard, Croatia is above the European average, just as Croatians work more frequently at other times that are difficult to reconcile with family life – in the evening, during the night and on Saturdays.

“One could say that the ban, in terms of the promotion of workers’ rights, is a much less robust instrument than, for example, a much simpler one – higher remuneration for Sunday work and closer monitoring of the total number of hours worked in a week as well as overtime,” Matković says.

He notes that it is only in the latest version of the Labour Act that the state recognises Sunday work as work that requires additional remuneration.

“It is telling that the state has legally defined remuneration only for Sunday but not for, for example, night work or overtime, while work in the evening and work on Saturdays is not mentioned,” Matković says.

Consumers will have a hard time adapting

In a comment on the fact that we live in a consumer society and that in Croatia there is a trend of liberalisation and not restriction of shop working hours, Lažnjak says it is evident that changes in the behaviour of consumers are not likely to be easy.

“Once they come into being, informal institutes cannot be changed arbitrarily just like that,” she says, noting that shopping on Sundays and public holidays has existed for the past 30 years and has become a part of consumers’ habits and society’s culture.

This raises the question of whether it is possible for Croatia, as a society, to embrace, instead of consumption, some other values as more important, and whether Croatians will now, like Slovenians, go to the country on Sundays in large numbers instead of going shopping.