Now that Halloween is over, retailers can go full steam ahead with their festive stock, as Christmas shopping is about to get underway. 

While some organised customers will have already perused the shelves to buy Christmas gifts, dresses for work nights out, food and drink, and wrapping paper, there will be millions who haven’t even thought about Santa Claus yet. 

However, this is set to change now. According to Yesmail Interactive, 38.1 per cent of shoppers begin buying for Christmas before November, with this jumping to 69.8 per cent who have started before December.

Most retailers have already begun the ‘Christmas creep’, which is when they introduce festive products, such as food, decorations, gifts, or clothes, before the traditional shopping season begins. This is so that those who want to get ahead of the game with their Christmas shopping can still find the goods, and retailers can capitalise on this demand. 

As a huge number of Brits are set to begin their Christmas shopping, shops need to fully showcase their Yuletide stock now. This means displaying the items that sell particularly well at Christmastime, advertising their festive products in the window, and decorating these aisles, shelves or racks to draw customers’ attention to them. 

It is also a good idea to have plenty of storage available to put extra stock and avoid running low; hire more staff to cope with the increase in customer traffic; and make sure the running of the store is as efficient as possible. 

This would be the worst time of the year to neglect retail maintenance, so make sure your store is in the best condition for the Christmas rush.