Tobacconists are taking a further step in diversifying their activities as tobacco sales continue to decline.
About twenty ATMs will be put into service at tobacconists “from next november“, Announced Tuesday in a joint statement the Confederation of tobacconists and Loomis, a subsidiary of the Swedish group Securitas specializing in the transport of funds. The 24,000 tobacco dealers in the territory will then be offered to host this new service, said Loomis and the Confederation.
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“Cash withdrawal is one of the essential services that the network can provide“, Estimates Philippe Coy, president of the Confederation of tobacconists, demonstrating”local utility carried on a daily basis“By a network at”unique mesh“And”very high availability»Open establishments«an average of 12 hours a day, six days a week“.
Diversification
Tobacconists will thus increase the diversification initiated in recent years to offset the steady decline in tobacco sales, over which they have a monopoly and which still represents their main source of income. They achieve 40 billion euros in sales per year, including 21.8 billion from tobacco products, on which they receive a commission of 8.1%. But these merchants also live on a myriad of other services: sale of games from La Française des Jeux (10.7 billion euros per year), PMU betting (3 billion), bar and restaurant (1, 8 billion), sale of newspapers (1 billion), snacking (700 million), vaping products (220 million), or collection of taxes, management of Nickel bank accounts and postal parcels, sale of SNCF tickets … a recent partnership has been established with the distributor Casino, allowing them to host a food department.
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Besides “some 1,700 tobacconists“Are today”postal product resellers, which represents 7% of La Poste’s contact points», Specified Cazaban-Marque, director of the operational pole of the Confederation of tobacconists. Also, some 12,000 tobacconists, or one in two, have collected 94 million euros on behalf of the tax authorities, for payment of fines, nursery, canteen or hospital bills, since the establishment of this service in July 2020, with more than 100,000 transactions per month.