Britons to spend £1m a minute in snowy shopping spree

BRITONS will splash out almost £1 Million a minute today, defying the big chill in a massive last-gasp Christmas shopping rush.

Many Christmas shoppers will brave the weather for last minute bargains Many Christmas shoppers will brave the weather for last-minute bargains

An estimated 13.3 million people will hit the stores to ensure the arctic conditions that have caused travel chaos and played havoc with deliveries do not get in the way of their traditional family celebration.

Tills will be ringing up £57 million an hour, or £951,000 a minute, as shoppers stock up on last minute presents, food and drink before the four-day holiday season begins. 

Researchers have found that around 18 per cent of late spending - about £246 million - will be put on credit cards as people delay bills till the new year and forget about the recession.

Stuart McKeggie, head of credit cards at Sainsbury's, said : "Once again there looks set to be a stampede of shoppers on Christmas eve as many people leave their shopping to the last minute before Christmas.

“In these prudent times, we believe people are looking at ways to stretch their budgets and take advantage of some of the great deals.”

Another survey claimed the spree was fuelled by festive guilt. Experts said purchasing of “guilt gifts” and “just-in-case” presents for friends and family sent the cost of Christmas soaring by £3billion.

Sian Harrison of moneysupermarket. com said: “With just one shopping day left before Christmas, shoppers are keen not to appear Scrooge-like in front of friends and family and will be overcompensating by indulging in lots of little guilt gifts.”

Sainsbury’s reckon one in five of us plans to finish the shopping at the last minute. And nearly two million late-comers will do virtually all their shopping today. Shoppers have been able to snap up plenty of bargains as shops and internet sites have brought forward January sales. 

Staff at Bluewater Shopping Centre in Kent said yesterday they expect more than 600,000 shoppers

to have passed through their doors this week in the late rush. 

Spokesman Andrew Parkinson said: “A combination of schools being on holiday, many people on annual leave, and the weather experienced late last week, have all combined to make the final four days busier that anticipated.

“Last night our car parks were still over 50 percent full at 11pm.” 

According to Sainsbury’s research, it is men who are more likely to leave Christmas shopping until the last minute. Nineteen per cent said they would be doing some festive shopping on Christmas Eve, compared with 18 per cent of women. 

People in the South-east are most behind – on average nine per cent of their shopping will be done

on Christmas Eve. Those in the Midlands are the most organised with just four per cent planning to finish their Christmas shopping today.

Meanwhile the Royal Mail said it was doing “everything possible” to ensure deliveries on time. It said the

“severe weather” made certain roads impassable but the majority of deliveries would still arrive today.

“More than 95 per cent of Royal Mail’s operation is working completely normally and we expect virtually all of the seasonal postbag of more than 100 million a day to be delivered by Christmas,” said a spokesman.

“Our people are out on delivery in often appalling weather conditions to keep the mail moving and we’re focused on doing everything we possibly can to deliver all customers’ letters and parcels.”

Supermarkets Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury said they had been forced to cancel deliveries because of the

treacherous conditions. 

Asda said a “small number” of online orders had been affected. Tanya Lawler, Sainsbury’s director of online, said: “We’ve been offering alternative delivery times where possible.”

A Tesco spokesman said: “All of our drivers are facing these challenges head on and we have now increased capacity to try and make sure that nobody is left disappointed.”

Online retailer Amazon said it also expected to deliver most presents if they had been ordered in

time.

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