15 million expected to fight for last-minute Christmas gifts

c 2009

Christmas shoppers on Oxford Street, central London Photo: PA

Today is predicted to be the busiest shopping day of the year, which could see High Street takings reach up to £2 billion.
Sales figures suggest that millions have delayed their Christmas shopping in the hope of getting a bargain, and stores have begun to significantly cut the price of a wide range of gift items.

 

Many stores are to extend their trading hours in the final shopping days before Christmas, with some staying open until midnight.
Many will test Sunday trading restrictions by introducing a "browsing time" of up to one hour to extend the normal six hours of opening.
From Monday, more than 800 supermarkets and smaller food stores will be trading 24 hours a day until Christmas Eve.
Professor Joshua Bamfield, the director of the Centre for Retail Research, said: 'When money is tight, there is a tendency to push back Christmas shopping until the last minute.
'There will be a big surge from now on. You could call it a planned panic."
Among the supermarkets, Tesco will have 495 large stores trading 24 hours a day from Monday morning, while Asda will have 223 and another 100 open until midnight.
Sainsbury's will have 24 stores trading 24 hours a day, plus 221 open until midnight.
Morrisons opens its stores until 10pm.
Marks & Spencer will be opening 28 of its larger stores until midnight next week, while 113 of its Simply Food outlets will trade round the clock.
Debenhams will open 100 of its 156 department stores until 11pm. Other retailers will be also be trading late into the night.
Official retail sales figures published earlier this week revealed a fall in the value and volume of sales in November compared with October, the first monthly fall in six months.
City analysts believe this is indicative of a shift to last-minute panic buying.
Stephen Robertson, the director general of the British Retail Consortium, said: "As many people start their holidays, we're expecting bumper trading - retail sales for the day should top £2billion.
"In recent years people have increasingly left their Christmas shopping to the last minute.
"This is a risky strategy if you want to be sure must-have presents aren't sold out, but it is likely to mean there is plenty of shopping still to be done.
"Let's hope snow doesn't stop people getting to stores."