Saturday 5 October 2019

langer donnerstag

Though this thirtieth anniversary of the 1989 decision to allow retail operations greater flexibility in opening hours falls on a Saturday—the last day of the working week for which stores were obliged to close up at 14:00, something I can still remember from when I first moved to Germany, the Extended Thursdays rule allowed businesses to stay open for one day a week past the statutory closing time of 18:30, addressing weekend hours as well.
Impacted employees who had to reckoning with their schedules disrupted on a weekly basis referred to Thursdays as Schlado—a portmanteau, an acronym for sh*tty long Donnerstag. Since the 1960s, one langer Samstag was permitted a quarter, occasionally more depending on when Advent began as the lead up to Christmas. Since 2003, most stores remain open until 20:00 Monday through Saturday (laws now vary greatly by state), with Langer Donnerstag only relevant to banking branches, doctors and some government offices.