Holiday Shoppers in Paris Shift from Big malls to online stores after November 13 Terror Attacks

After the terror attack in Paris on November 13, shoppers in Paris during the Holiday season has shifted away from big malls to online stores and places closer to their homes.

Bloomberg News reported that Department stores, restaurants, and hotels in the City of Light have fewer visitors after the terror attacks last month that killed 130 people. The main store of Galeries Lafayette in central Paris declined by a third in the last two weeks. A burberry stand has more staffs than customers.

Meanwhile, Accor SA Chief Executive Officer Sebastien Bazin expects demands for hotel room in the capital to decline for the next four months. The service sector in France also dropped in November to the lowest level in three months. There are also less tourists visiting the city, as flights to paris went down 13 percent during the holiday season.

However, residential and local neighborhoods far from big establishments from the center have more activities. Carrefour, Franprix, and Monoprix supermarkets close to the La Motte-Picquet-Grenelle metro stop located in the 15th arrondissement had more customers than usual. The convenience stores of Franprix-owner Casino Guichard-Perrachon also recorded more shoppers than usual.

London Sanford C. Bernstein analyst Bruno Monteyne predicts this trend to continue for at least three months.

According to RFI, the tighter security measures in the Paris region has adversely impacted the growth in the private sector. Financial data from Markit revealed that France's final Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) went down 2 points to 51 from 52.6 in the month before the attacks.

Paris Express on the other hand reported that holiday shopping season in Paris started strong, despite the rainy days. This growth is seen on online orders, while national in-store sales dropped. Galeries Lafayette spokeswoman said traffic to their Web store increased in the past two weeks.

France sticks with its earlier projection of 1.1 percent gross domestic product growth for this year. Prime Minister Manuel Valls said Tuesday that the lost growth will hopefully be covered by the end of the year, despite the effects of last month's terror attacks.