Retail regulation: fire safety, accessibility and obligations 2026

Type M covers every retail shop, including shopping centres, malls, supermarkets and covered markets. Occupancy is calculated at one person per 3 m² of sales area at ground level and one person per 5 m² on upper floors or in basements. Storage areas not open to the public do not count.

ℹ The fifth-category threshold for type M A sales area threshold of 200 m² for the principal room, giving an occupancy below 100 at one person per 3 m². No public access to a basement in the fifth category. Basement storage alone is possible where access is restricted to staff and the separation achieves EI 60.

Any shop above 40 m² of floor area requires planning permission, or a prior declaration for extensions at or below 40 m². Food retail and shops above 1,000 m² of sales area also require a retail operating consent from the departmental retail planning commission. That runs alongside the planning determination and can take four to six months.

ℹ The retail operating consent Threshold: a shop above 1,000 m² of sales area, or an extension taking it above 1,000 m². Determination: two months for the commission's decision. An appeal to the national commission adds four months. The criteria examined are urban integration, the effect on the existing retail fabric and the environmental footprint. Note that this consent is distinct from planning permission: both are needed before opening.

The provisions particular to type M complete the general articles. The principal requirements bear on smoke control of large floorplates, often through roof vents; automatic fire detection, mandatory from the third category; means of rescue — hose reels every 25 m, one extinguisher per 200 m²; and the roof structure, in double-skin steel deck or fire-retardant treated timber.

The calculation follows the general rule: one unit of passage per 100 people. A shop for 600 people, in the third category, must have exits representing at least six units, that is 3.60 m of cumulative width. Emergency exits open in the direction of escape, with panic hardware, and discharge directly onto the public highway or into a protected route to the outside. Emergency exits may not sit more than 40 m from a protected stair or a direct exit.

A shop in categories one to four must be fully accessible. Fifth-category shops must make the services offered accessible, without necessarily making the whole unit accessible. The principal points of attention are access to the till, the aisles between shelving and the fitting rooms.

ℹ Accessibility checklist at design stage → Entrance: threshold at or below 2 cm, door at least 0.90 m, a reception point at or below 0.80 m. → Principal aisles between shelving: at least 1.40 m; secondary aisles at least 0.90 m. → Accessible tills: at least one in ten with a counter lowered to 0.80 m and a knee space. → Accessible fitting room: at least one measuring 1.50 m × 1.30 m with a grab rail. → Lift or ramp: on multiple levels, accessible service is mandatory to every level open to the public.

Food retail — supermarkets, grocers, butchers, cheesemongers — is additionally subject to public health regulation: washable surfaces, separated clean and dirty flows, maintenance of the cold chain with a delivery room at or below 8 °C, a dedicated unloading dock. These requirements do not fall under the fire regulation but govern the design of the plant rooms, the docks and the refrigerated stores.

Food retail with a preparation area — delicatessen, butchery with cutting, bakery — is additionally subject to the European food hygiene regulation. The preparation space, treated as a professional kitchen, can be classified a medium-risk room where the heat is significant, as with a bakery oven. The extraction canopy and the fat storage rooms are then subject to the type N rules.

ℹ ✔ Summary for the economist Construction cost of a standard shop, excluding land, external works and catering equipment: 1,020 – 2,240 €/m² of floor area. A shopping centre: 1,530 – 3,060 €/m² according to standing, excluding tenant works. Above 1,000 m² of sales area, allow a budget of 10,000 to 30,000 € for the retail consent study and a four- to six-month delay. Food retail: a refrigerated delivery dock and staff sanitary accommodation must be in the brief. Structural warranty insurance is mandatory for the construction of any building open to the public where the client is a professional.

General public-building regulation — classification, commission, safety file — is developed in its own article. The restaurant article covers type N, often associated with ground-floor retail or retail parks. Accessibility is treated in detail in the accessibility article. The mixed-use article covers buildings where shops occupy the ground floor.

ℹ The construction economist on demand. Your retail or shopping centre project needs an estimate that takes in the public-building regime, retail planning and accessibility. Submit your file on quostra.com and a construction economist prices the regulatory constraints from the brief.

Sources: the order of 25 June 1980 as amended for type M, the order of 8 December 2014 on accessibility, the retail planning legislation and its decrees, the European food hygiene regulation, and the commercial code.

Reference basis of the figures

The ratios per square metre and per item on this page are stated in January 2026 values. They were updated from January 2025 values, the basis adopted for the whole cocoon, using the BT01 all-trades index published monthly by INSEE on its 2010 base: 132.0 in January 2025, 134.7 in January 2026, a coefficient of 1.0205.

The global amounts quoted as examples, and any rents, charges or receipts expressed per year or per night, remain on their own basis: a building cost index does not apply to them.

To bring the ratios forward, apply the usual revision formula: updated value = page value × (BT01 for the month in question / 134.7). The BT01 measures contractors' input costs, labour at 44.9 % and materials at 36.5 %, not the prices actually tendered.