Bruges city council is looking into ways of curbing the proliferation of tourist shops in the West Flemish capital. Businesses selling chocolates, beer and souvenirs are the focus of the city fathers’ attention. Alderman Mathijs Goderis (Flemish socialist Vooruit) isn’t pulling any punches: ‘Often the products in these stores are of inferior quality! We want to prevent more of these shops setting up a store.’
The increase in the number tourist shops in the city centre has already been the subject of discussion for many years. The topic again surfaced during Monday night's Bruges city council meeting when alderman Mathijs Goderis pointed out that it is not possible simply to ban shops that cater exclusively for tourists.
‘There is no legal basis to refuse permission for a tourist shop when it moves into existing commercial premises. But the city cabinet will explore the possibility of refusing a certain, yet-to-be-defined category of shop, in the future. We need to develop a new subcategory of commercial premises in a new bylaw’
Drawing up a new bylaw won’t be easy because how do you allow for high quality chocolate shops, but ban others?
‘It will be a big challenge to make this legally watertight, but we are willing to take on that challenge’ Goderis told councillors.
If his bid does not succeed, only two options remain, Goderis says. ‘Either a ban in the entire city centre, or in a few specific streets. Like in Katelijnestraat and in Mariastraat, where the problem is immense.’
Tourist traps
Even chocolatier Dominique Persoone, who runs ‘The Chocolate Line’ in Bruges together with his son Julius, thinks things are really getting out of hand: ‘These tourist shops are springing up like mushrooms here in Bruges. They are ‘tourist traps’. They cheat the tourists. They think they are buying Belgian chocolate because there is a picture of the Atomium or Manneke Pis on the box. But on the back of the box you see that it is chocolate from the Czech Republic.’
‘I don't see this as a threat to artisan chocolatiers. But it is a threat to the city of Bruges and tourism. Why should tourists come to a city that only has souvenir shops like that? I am glad the city council wants to intervene. If we want to keep a better quality of tourist visiting Bruges, we definitely have to react.’
Katelijnestraat is one of those streets in Bruges with lots of tourist shops. People even talk of it as the ‘chocolate street’. Daniël Jonckheere started one of those typical tourist shops there 20 years ago: the Bierpaleis. ‘We mainly sell beer and collector's items, things like beer glasses and posters. We also used to sell souvenirs. But we stopped doing that. There are so many souvenir shops that it's better to specialise in other products.’
Björn Floréal works in the Bierpaleis. ‘I’ve noticed that there are a lot of chocolate and waffle shops. It's becoming too much. Bruges needs other shops that offer quality. Locals see the difference between good quality and poor quality. But tourists don't always notice that. They are often blind to it because they are usually only in Bruges for a short spell.’