A new census on Parisian shops was carried out in March-April 2005 on the initiative of the City of Paris, the Delegation of the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry -CCIP- and the Apur, who together assembled and set up the Database on Trade and Commerce in Paris (BD-Com). It followed up from previous surveys in 2000 and 2003. In 2005, there were 61,800 retail shops and commercial services in Paris, representing 74% of the ground floor premises of Parisian buildings, not including those dedicated solely to housing or offices. This figure is stable, with even a slight increase of 62 shops per year. Certain activities have increased their number of outlets after a period of decline, namely restaurants, fishmongers and book-shops, as well as hotels and bank branches. Other activities were already growing and have continued to open new outlets: beauty salons, costume jewellery shops, estate agents, café-bars and art galleries. Small supermarkets or “supérettes”, general food stores with a surface area of between 120m2 and 400m2, increased at a rate of 36 units per year between 2003 and 2005, i.e. +13%. With regard to closures, the activities most affected have been sex-shops, newsagents and garages. The number of wholesale clothing, textile and leather goods shops in Paris has been declining, particularly in the Sentier (the “rag trade” district) where they have long been established. Finally, Paris had 8,300 vacant premises in 2005, i.e. 10% of its street level premises. This figure has been decreasing as it represented 11% in 2003.