Amazon ready for Christmas as last-minute spending frenzy looms
The clock is ticking for last minute Christmas shoppers as stores brace themselves for the final countdown to the big day.
Supermarkets are gearing up for tomorrow which is expected to be one of the busiest food shopping days this week - while a rush of last minute online buys is keeping 3,500 workers busy at the Amazon distribution centre in Staffordshire.
Staff at the Rugeley centre are processing orders for must have toys and stocking fillers around the clock.
The 700,000 square foot centre is the size of ten football pitches and houses millions of gifts and gadgets.
This three storey stock room towers over the huge warehouse, where orders are processed and packed before being shipped off to addresses across Europe.
The maze of millions of items of stock is organised like a futuristic library.
Each item is individual given a unique code and storage location which is logged onto a European wide database.
To find an item, workers use an electronic scanning device which plans a route for them, according to the unique codes.
Due to the vast size of the warehouse, popular items and must have toys are stored in multiple locations around the centre for efficiency.
The centre, based at Towers Business Park is the third largest Amazon site in the UK and is open 24 hours a day, 363 days a year, closed only on Christmas day and New Year's Day.
With most presents wrapped, the attention falls to the kitchen and now supermarkets are predicting the rush to be tomorrow at 1pm with many supermarkets now open around the clock.
The lunch hour will see queues soar as people dash to get last minute gifts and food.
Simon Woolley, store manager of Morrisons in Willenhall said: "We are ready for our peak trade. We have seen that people are more organised this year and are savvier working to a budget, however the big food shop is always last and we are expecting madness but we are prepared."
He added: "We have hundreds of turkeys but dressed fish is really popular at Christmas too."
High street spending reached £1.2billion on what was branded 'panic Saturday' but that figure is expected to be topped tomorrow with £1.3 billion expected to be spent on the UK high street.
