This is the sixth time that the four large advertising associations and city marketing associations, the retail association, the Chamber of Industry and Commerce, the district craftsmen's association and the Catholic and Protestant churches have signed the so-called "Bonn Agreement on Sundays Open for Business". It runs from 2025 to the end of 2027.
The signatories have agreed on a maximum number of Sundays open for business and the occasions on which they may be held, subject to approval by the city council. The twelve Sundays are a total number for the four city district centers.
These include Advent Sundays as well as individual large events such as the BonnFest in Bonn city center, the wine festival in Bad Godesberg, the citizens' festival in Duisdorf and the district festival with trade show in Duisdorf.
Victoria Appelbe, Head of Business Development in Bonn, emphasized the city's interest in finding an amicable solution: "We want to position Bonn with its four centers as a successful shopping city. This includes not only, but also, open Sundays. The Bonn agreement demonstrates the solidarity of the institutions and increases legal certainty."
Karina Kröber, Chairwoman of the "city-Marketing bonn" association, emphasized: "None of the signatory institutions wants to hold the maximum number of Sundays open for business permitted by law: In Bonn, the maximum permitted number of Sundays open for business is therefore significantly undercut."
Nationwide exemplary regulation for legal certainty
Such an agreement is unique in Germany. In the past, the city's economic development department has been asked several times by other cities how this result was achieved and asked to send a sample agreement. The decisive factor is the willingness to engage in dialog on all sides and the high culture of discussion among those involved. It has not yet been possible to reach such an agreement in other cities.
The agreement was first drawn up after a regulatory order to keep stores open on an Advent Sunday was not approved by the council in the fall of 2010. At the time, the Council had asked the "city-marketing bonn" association and the administration to hold talks with all parties involved about holding open Sundays. The result is the agreement, which is renegotiated every three years at the invitation of the Office for Economic Development and "city-marketing bonn".