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How a Berlin start-up is challenging Amazon in the lockdown
Logistics software firm Banbutsu boosts local traders by enabling same-day delivery. Elena Matera, 28.12.2020 - 11:00 Uhr
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Photo: banbutsuThe first packages from the cosmetics retailer Purish are delivered on a cargo bike.
Berlin - One of the biggest challenges of e-commerce is logistics. When, for example, a customer in Friedrichshain makes an online purchase from a toy shop in Mitte, the package is first brought to a distribution centre outside of Berlin. The parcel will sit there for a while and then be passed on to a delivery driver who then drives it back into the city and delivers it to the customer.
The Hofbrau Berlin, the city’s biggest restaurant, started serving as a homeless center after its dining operations were shuttered.
The crackdown mandated by the government of longtime Chancellor Angela Merkel was needed because the “lockdown lite” that went into effect in early November, when all stores and schools were allowed to remain open, didn’t work. In a country that just months ago won global praise for its initial success in combating COVID-19, transmission rates have risen to some of the highest in the world. Germany now ranks in the top 20 of total infections worldwide.
The seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in Germany spiked from 21 in November to 179 per 100,000 people last week, according to the Robert Koch Institute, the country’s national agency for disease control. That is more than three times the number 50 that the agency considers acceptable.
German MPs propose online shopping tax to save city centers
Under the proposal, each package delivered would be taxed, and the funds handed to brick-and-mortar retailers. The idea has spurred an outcry from trade associations.
Buyers from huge online retailers could face a delivery tax if a proposal by German MPs gets the go ahead
The German Bundestag is considering a financial package tax for online purchases in order to support retailers who have been pushed out of business due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The proposed tax, which has spurred an outcry on the part of German trade associations, would be collected directly from the retailer and paid to the tax office.
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New restrictions in Germany that will shutter most shops to curb the second coronavirus wave have raised fears of thousands of job losses, industry representatives said Tuesday.
Without additional government support, up to 50,000 shops with 250,000 employees might no longer have a future, the German Retail Association (HDE) said in a statement.
The industry can no longer survive without tailor-made financial assistance , the HDE added.
To curb a sharp rise in Covid-19 infections, Germany will close non-essential shops from Wednesday until at least January 10, in addition to measures already in place since November that have closed bars, restaurants, leisure centres and cultural sites.