Hamburg, 26 March 2020 \u2013 <\/strong>ePages, one of the leading providers of online shop software in the cloud, wants to help brick-and-mortar merchants in the coronavirus crisis with free online shops so that they can keep running their business. Small shop owners have the option of creating their own free online shop to mitigate the economic consequences of the current situation while their customers can continue to order safely from home. The service will remain free of charge at least until the end of June and beyond if the regulations on shop closures persist, or if risk groups still need to be protected.<\/p>\n The measures against the coronavirus, which include the closure of brick-and-mortar shops, pose major challenges for the retail sector. \u201cBrick-and-mortar retailers are particularly affected by the corona crisis, especially small shop owners,” says Wilfried Beeck, founder and CEO of ePages. \u201cWhile online trade is booming, physical retail is partly fighting for its existence. We have brought partners with a resilient infrastructure on board, so that we can immediately provide a quick solution for thousands of merchants.\u201d The \u201cstayopen\u201d initiative is supported by many international ePages partners. In Germany, leading payment service provider Payone, the joint venture of the Ingenico Group and Deutscher Sparkassenverlag, and VR Payment, the payment organisation of the Volks- und Raiffeisenbanken, and Worldline\/SIX Payment Services, in Switzerland the largest hosting provider Hostpoint, in France Box e-commerce, in Spain Hostalia, in Finland the Vilkas Group, in Australia eCorner and in Portugal Dominios have joined the initiative so far. Updates on the participating partners can be found at epages.com\/stayopen.<\/p>\n The free online shops can be created via the following websites:<\/p>\n www.epages.com<\/a><\/p>\n www.payone.com\/corona<\/a> in Germany<\/p>\n www.vr-payment.de\/stayopen<\/a> in Germany<\/p>\n www.six-payment-services.com\/e-commerce-packs<\/a> in Germany und Austria<\/p>\n www.hostpoint.ch<\/a> in Switzerland<\/p>\n www.boxecommerce.com<\/a> in France<\/p>\n www.hostalia.com<\/a> in Spain<\/p>\n www.vilkas.fi<\/a> in Finland<\/p>\n www.ecorner.com.au<\/a> in Australia<\/p>\n