Italy: Over a thousand fuel retailers closed operations in January-October 2014

A net total of 1,047 fuel retail business stopped operations during the first ten months of 2014 as 310 new ones opened and 1,357 closed down leaving a total of 20,748 in operations, according to statistics released in late January by the Italian Autonomous Federation of Fuel Retailers (FAIB).

The organization, known as the Federazione Autonoma Italiana Benzinai, said that the number of retailers in operation in October was 3.2% lower than in the same month in 2003.

The regions where most fuel retailers closed down were Piemonte, Liguria, Marche, Toscana and Veneto, for the most part located in the north of the country.

The federation announced the statistics in a report titled “a 2014 to forget”.