With Christmas barely a month away, the temporary shops that you only see in shopping centres in November and December are desperately increasing stock levels of cheap crap to unprecedented levels.
"We are selling a LOT of shit" said the guy running a "Santa's Workshop" out of an old "Zavvi" shopfront in the cheap end of the Watford Harlequin Centre. "A lot of gimmicky plastic, things that may or may not meet trading standards, and lots of random 'gift sets'. We need to make sure we have crates of shit delivered daily, but we are struggling to keep up with the demand."
"Shit like Santa figurines, Victorian model villages that light up, and fleece blankets with sleeves are priced to move, and they are SHIFTING".
Recent research shows that cheap novelty shit always seems to sell well, but it is not conclusively proven whether it is because of the recession, or because people just can't seem to get enough tat in their lives.
An early shopper in Birmingham city centre this morning said "There aren't enough hours in the days up to Christmas for me to buy all the tacky pointless shit I need, or can barely afford."
Tesco is now trying to squeeze competitors out of this lucrative merchandise sector, filling shelves with unfeasibly large festive tins of biscuits, boxes of 12 incredibly nasty crackers, and overpriced giftsets containing a thimble of un-named rose wine, 2 quality street and a book on how to make a spritzer.
"Selling this shit at Christmas is income all retailers rely on", said a Tesco spokesman, "but we think now is the time for us to concentrate more on becoming the number one UK shit-sellers".