V. SPECIAL LATE CLOSING

Today local authorities have power to allow a special late closing for shops on one or more days in the weeks. The shops can then remain open an hour or two later than on normal evenings. One of the objects of this survey was to find out on what days, the public required special late closing, if at all, and till what time it wanted shops to remain open. Obviously no firm answer can be given to this question. Special late closing is a supplement to normal closing, the more unsatisfactory normal closing hours are to the shopping public the stronger feelings will become over special late closing.

Is Special late closing needed, if so on what days

It was found possible to frame one question in order to answer the two problems, whether the public wanted late closing at all and if so on what day or days of the week. It was farmed in the form “on what special day(s) would you like shops selling these goods to remain open later in the evenings?” Informants were allowed either to specify a day or days for special late closing or to indicate that they did not require special late closing at all. In this way it was thought possible to ascertain how large a section of shoppers needed late closing and whether their preferences were sufficiently standard to have certain common late closing days all over the country.

In all commodities about 40% of the shopping public do not require special late closing days at all. The public’s choice of special late days is rather restricted. There are no big commodity differences and shoppers would appear to be only specifically interested in Fridays and Saturdays as late closing evenings. Between 25-30% preferences varying slightly by commodities are recorded for both days.

Although this survey has produced no direct evidence on which days are most popular for shopping, special late closing preferences do suggest that shopping activity is always most marked at the end of the week. If the solution of the present impasse between the public’s need for later evening closing and the existing shortage of distributive workers, should be on lines of later evening closing with an extra closing day once a week, this indicates conclusively, which days should be avoided for such full day closing.

A regional analysis of this question was undertaken to see whether preferences for late closing days varied significantly by regions. Results were not sufficiently clear cut for detailed comment. It is worthwhile observing that the lowest percentages 'not wanting any special late closing days' were recorded in industrial areas, whereas the highest percentages ‘not wanting special late closing’ occurred in areas with large agricultural populations.

What would be a suitable late closing time?

It has already been pointed out that the shopper’s attitude to the special late closing will depend upon normal closing conditions and that the two problems must be considered together. Some idea however of what the public considers to be special late closing can be got by asking for a specific time. The question “till what later time would it suit you to be able to buy these goods on special evening(s) in the week, was designed to get this information.

In general the times till which informants wanted to buy goods on special late closing nights were about one hour later than the times required for ordinary evenings. Thus peak preferences were between 6.46 and 7.15 compared with 5.46 and 6.15 on ordinary evenings. The difference between the two suggested closing times indicates that there is a real distinction in informants' minds between ordinary evening and special late closing. Special late closing presents a similar problem to ordinary evening closing: thus a special late closing hour around 7 p.m. would satisfy over 75/° of shoppers, a closing hour around 8 p.m. would satisfy over 95%.

The case of special late closing shows only too clearly the conflict of interest between ordinary workers and distributive workers. Table 31 sets out the preferences of the two occupations in respect of clothes purchases only. Clothes have been taken as a typical case.

Distributive workers as a group are much more hostile to special late closing than ordinary workers. Even those distributive workers who allow their shopping needs to take precedence over their aversion to late closing still show conclusively that their idea of late closing is substantially earlier than the ordinary worker’s idea of the same. Thus 18% of distributive workers mention times before 6.45 compared with 11% of all the workers, whilst 15% of distributive workers mention late closing times after 7.15 compared with 30% of all other workers.

Finally a special analysis of the preferences of working women for special later closing times for clothing shops showed that only 68% would be satisfied with a 7 p.m. closing time but that 98% would be satisfied with an 8 p.m. closing time. Clearly the marginal hour is a matter of some importance to the working woman shopper.

Conclusion

About 40% of shoppers do not want any late closing nights at all. Those who do want late closing are primarily interested in Friday or Saturday evenings - percentages for other days are very low indeed. As a general rule least interest in special late closing was shown in areas with a large rural population, while preferences for Fridays or Saturdays were highest in areas with a large industrial population. Informants want special late closing times to be about one hour later than ordinary closing times. A special late closing hour around 7 p.m. would satisfy about 75% of shoppers a closing hour around 8 p.m. would satisfy over 95%.