‘It’s hard for us’: Paris small businesses bear brunt of protest violence

Paris, France – Jagged shards of glass frame the hole kicked through the window of Hassan Rashdul’s mobile phone shop near Place de la Republique, the epicentre of looting and rioting that swept this part of Paris on Saturday.

“I was crying,” Rashdul says, as he watches a CCTV livestream on his phone.

The glass countertop is shattered, the floor carpeted with broken glass. The display cases that were full of new and reconditioned mobile phones, iPads, and computers are empty. The walls where headphones, cables, phone cases and other accessories hung have been stripped bare.

“It’s really terrible,” the 32-year-old Rashdul says. “It was very, very hard for us… It’s already hard for small business owners like us. We’re not operating to keep the business going, but just to survive, really.”

Rashdul says he’s lost at least 70,000-euros ($78,600) worth of stock. His insurance won’t cover it, because loss from theft wasn’t included in his policy, though Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has said the government will cover employee salaries of about 3,000 businesses across France affected by the rioting.

There will also be a “dedicated support fund” to help businesses restock, the French government has announced. Lecornu has ordered more than 200 investigators to work on catching the perpetrators of the riots and looting.

But the rioters are moving quickly: Some businesses say they found their stock being sold online within hours of being looted.

“Stolen items from this weekend are being offered for sale on certain platforms,” digital minister Anne Le Henanff said on X. “We expect these platforms to remove the listings in question without delay.”

She held a meeting with representatives of six platforms in the presence of Interior and Justice Ministry officials. According to the French commerce ministry, representatives of Vinted, Amazon, eBay, Leboncoin, Meta and TikTok, as well as French online retail association Fevad, were invited.

“They will also be required to cooperate closely with state authorities so that those reselling stolen goods can be prosecuted,” Le Henanff added.

Around Rashdul’s shop, there are mini-markets, opticians, phone stores and cafes that bear testimony to the violence last weekend.

Some are boarded up. Others, where there’s nothing left to steal, have been left open and exposed to the damp October weather by their owners.

But amid his suffering, Rashdul spots a glimmer of hope.

“There’s another side to it,” he says, “a positive – local customers, people from the neighbourhood.”

These people have set up appeals on social media to secure help for shopkeepers, he says.

“They really make you want to try again,” says Rashdul. “People are helping us to rebuild our shop, to get back to work and serve this neighbourhood once again.”

But it will not be easy. It took Rashdul, who immigrated to France from Bangladesh, 10 years to build his business. He now calls himself a proud French citizen – respectful of the right to protest but also worried about the impact of violence on businesses like his, and on France as a whole.

“Even though I want to rebuild, next Saturday they’ve announced another protest,” he says. “I know we’re in a democracy and there’s a right to protest, but if that ends up in more looting, then that’s hard on France and damaging for its international reputation.”