“Christmas without Amazon”

In a major campaign under the banner of "Christmas without Amazon",business owners, trade unions, environmental activists, writers and politicians in France are protesting against the unfair treatment of retailers, whose businesses are currently in lockdown, as compared with online traders, who are benefiting from this. Despite the billions handed out by the government, many small businesses in France are on the brink of bankruptcy. The restrictions on retailing in the run-up to Christmas, a period which is so important for shops, has attracted criticism in Italy also. The Confesercenti retailers' association stressed that "this second wave of health emergency is creating a very serious competition imbalance between the real stores and the web".