9 September 2026, Bucharest, Romania – Partners from across Europe have concluded a 2 day Skills4Retail consortium meeting in Bucharest, taking stock of what the programme has delivered so far and setting out how it will be rolled out more widely.
The meeting, held on 8 and 9 September, brought together organisations working across education, training, research, industry and skills development.
Discussions focused on the achievements and lessons from the programme so far, approaches to scaling training at national level, stronger engagement with retailers and employers, development of the European Retail Skills Alliance, and the long-term sustainability of Skills4Retail.
For JA Malta, the meeting was also an opportunity to bring forward Malta’s experience of delivering the programme with local learners, training providers and retail employers, while identifying how the resources developed at European level can continue to be adapted to the realities of Malta’s retail sector.
Bucharest marks the point at which Skills4Retail moves out of development and piloting and into delivery at scale.
Launched in August 2023, Skills4Retail is a €4 million EU-funded project awarded under the Erasmus+ programme. The project began by establishing a detailed evidence base for the changing skills needs of the sector. Research involving more than 250 retailers, 100 educators and 40 industry experts informed the development of the European Retail Skills Strategy, five occupational archetypes and 15 personas representing different roles and stages of a retail career.
Those findings then shaped the training itself.
The programme's emerging skills training has reached 1,432 participants across eight European countries, considerably exceeding its original target of 800 participants. Learners completed 2,155 training modules, while an earlier reactive training programme reached a further 614 participants across four countries.
Skills4Retail has also developed modular curricula and supporting learning materials for new entrants, retail employees, managers and trainers, adapted into several European languages.
Delivering the same programme across very different education systems and labour markets has taught the partnership a good deal about what travels and what does not. Short, modular courses have proved far easier to fit around shift patterns and staff turnover than longer qualifications, and delivery has consistently depended on partners adapting content nationally and working with providers and employers already active in each market.
Work has run alongside this to widen the group of organisations committed to retail skills. The European Retail Skills Alliance now has more than 60 pledgers in 11 countries, among them education and training providers, employers and sector bodies.
“Retail is one of the first places where many young people encounter the working world, but it’s still too often treated as a temporary job rather than a sector in which people can build valuable skills and meaningful careers. Through Skills4Retail, we’ve seen what becomes possible when training is practical, flexible and connected to the realities of employers and learners. Our next challenge in Malta is to strengthen that connection further and bring more businesses into the process to create more opportunities for work-based learning, and making the skills gained through retail more visible and recognised”·
- Matthew Caruana, CEO of JA Malta
Over the two days, partners went through implementation in detail and decided what should be kept, adapted or reworked as the programme expands.
A separate industry session brought partners together with retailers to talk about current skills gaps, internships and work-based learning, and how companies can take a more direct role in the programme.
The second day focused on the longer-term future of the initiative, including Alliance development, opportunities to expand across Erasmus+ countries, sustainability and funding, final-phase planning and communications.
The next phase is about more than participant numbers. Partners intend to use the evidence built up through Skills4Retail to put in place training that employers recognise, shared quality standards, working partnerships between education providers and retailers, and a route for the training to continue once the project ends.
For JA Malta, this will mean continuing to engage local employers, educators, training providers and sector representatives to make the available training more accessible, strengthen pathways into retail and help ensure that the sector is recognised as a place where people can learn, progress and build a career.
For more information about Skills4Retail, visit:
https://skills4retail.eu/
About Skills4Retail
Skills4Retail is an EU-funded project that will lift the retail sector in Europe, which is responsible for 10% of the EU’s economy and includes 3.6 million retailers. The project's goal is to design a new Retail Skills Strategy and VET training programme that answers the skills needs retailers are reporting now and expect over the coming years.
The project is aimed at retailers in Europe who need to transform digitally to be competitive into the future. The Skills4Retail Consortium consists of 30 partners from 9 EU countries, including five Irish partners. Post-Covid, with increasing competition from large online retailers from other regions, Europe’s retailers need to become digitally sophisticated and competitive. Retail is also increasingly treated as a stepping stone rather than a career in its own right.
Skills4Retail aligns with the ‘Triple Transition’ and DG Grow’s transition pathway towards greener, more digital and more resilient retailers. The project began in September 2023 and will run for four years. Its content is demand-led, shaped by what retailers and industry bodies say their workforces will need.