The traditional weekly late night shopping evening has fallen out of favour, with the number of shoppers dropping by an average 30%.

The figure comes from a survey conducted by CityTraffic which measures the number of people going into shopping areas in the evening.

The trend is visible throughout the Netherlands with Utrecht showing the biggest fall, down by half in the past three years. Only Amsterdam has kept the number of shoppers for its late night opening stable.

‘The drop in footfall is enormous,’ Huib Lubbers of CityTraffic told the Telegraaf. ‘Leiden is even discussing whether to dispense with its evening altogether.’

Lubbers thinks the reason for the downturn comes mainly from Sunday opening. In the big cities, the cost of parking is also having an effect.