LONDON – The U.K.-wide tobacco display ban in small stores, including convenience stores, corner shops and newspaper stands, is effective this week. The ban has been in place in supermarkets since 2012.

Under the new rules, merchants will be required to store tobacco and cigarette products inside storage fixtures or behind curtains so that they can’t be easily seen by customers. Shop owners are also limited in how they promote their tobacco products, with promotion restricted to putting up a price list, posting price labels on shelves and displaying plain posters saying “cigarettes sold here.”

The ban is meant to go hand in hand with the implementation of plain packaging for tobacco products, which will go into effect in May 2016.

However, owners of small shops across the United Kingdom have raised concerns over how the ban may affect their store operations. According to Tobacco Retailers’ Alliance, as much as a third of the turnover of a typical newsagent comes from tobacco sales, and this measure creates unnecessary burden on retailers who already struggle to comply with numerous regulations. Store operators are concerned that, among other issues, the new regulations will increase transaction times and implementation costs including installation of new display equipment.