- Retail is Scotland’s largest private sector employer, supporting around 228,000 jobs and playing a central role in the country’s high streets and town centres.
- Retailers at Prosper UK’s Edinburgh roundtable highlighted retail crime, antisocial behaviour and rising employment and operating costs as barriers to growth.
- Businesses called for reform of business rates, stronger local partnerships and a policy environment that supports investment, employment and thriving high streets.
Retail is Scotland’s largest private sector employer, with around 228,000 people working in the sector directly and many more in the supply chains that depend on it. It accounts for close to a tenth of jobs in Scotland and around 7% of the country’s economic output, and is a vital part of high streets, town centres and communities across the country.
On 15 May 2026, Prosper UK held a roundtable in Edinburgh with senior figures from across Scottish retail, including national chains, independent high street retailers, garden centres, fast-food restaurants, outdoor brands and trade bodies. Participants described rising employment costs, business rates, energy and supply chain inflation, weaker footfall, and increasing retail crime and antisocial behaviour.
This report reflects the views of the businesses who took part. It sets out the challenges they identified and the changes they believe would help Scotland’s retail sector invest, employ and grow. The views expressed by participants do not necessarily represent Prosper UK policy.
Recommendations from Scottish Retailers
- Treat retail crime as an economic and community issue, not only a matter for policing, and sustain funding for Police Scotland’s Retail Crime Taskforce.
- Strengthen partnerships between retailers, the police, councils and community organisations, and use retail locations to bring local services together in town and city centres.
- Focus enforcement on repeat and organised offenders, provide health and social support for those living chaotic lives, and restore real consequences for low-level theft and the abuse of shop workers.
- Review the effect of concessionary bus travel on antisocial behaviour in retail centres, while protecting the wider benefits of affordable public transport for young people.
- Reduce the cumulative cost burden on labour-intensive retail, and assess the combined impact of employer National Insurance, the National Living Wage, energy costs and statutory sick pay before adding further costs.
- Reform and rebalance business rates so Scotland’s high streets are not left at a disadvantage, pass on rates relief in full when equivalent funding is available, avoid extending turnover-based valuation to retail, and fix the costly appeals system.
- Recognise the effect of Scotland’s wider tax position, including the income tax differential, on consumer spending power, recruitment and the relocation of talent and investment.
- Support independent retailers and town centre regeneration through long-term partnership, a stable climate for investment, and parking and access policies that do not deter shoppers.
- Engage with retail as a partner in growth rather than a target for revenue, and subject new interventions such as price controls to proper consultation and economic scrutiny before they are imposed.
- Recognise retail as a leading route into work, training and progression for young people, and remove the welfare cliff edges that discourage people from taking on more hours.
Read the full report
Download Prosper UK’s October 2026 report: Retail, High Streets and Growth: A Scottish Business Perspective.