Expected to be open Manchester retailer



?Being situated on a busy street means a lot of people walk past each day and many people will expect us to open on Christmas Day as well. We are going to be open but we don't expect sales to be high on Christmas Day.

Boxing Day and New Year's Day, however, actually prove to be really good for business. We are situated in a place that people can walk to if they want to avoid that second game of charades, or to buy cigarettes.

We are pretty immune to price rises and all the stuff in the press about how expensive Christmas will be this year will have little effect on us, or at least we hope not.

Impulse sales are key South east England retailer



?We intend to open on Christmas Day as usual because it is good for our business and in general we believe that people want us to be open, just in case!

We traditionally do well on impulse sales of boxed chocolates, beer and wine and other stuff, and I don't see this changing this year.

With rising mortgage costs, consumers may be reluctant to spend money on expensive presents such as electrical goods or perfume, but they will always want to make a good impression with chocolates or a good bottle of wine for the in-laws.

Our flower sales also rocket in the run-up to Christmas, so we get more in.

Premium sells well London retailer



?Being a specialist food retailer, Christmas is traditionally the busiest time of year for us as people look to buy premium products, such as cheeses, expensive wines, Christmas puddings, tins of chocolate biscuits, etc.

There is a concern that people will want to cut back on their spending this Christmas and that high-quality food and drink sales could be affected as people switch to cheaper items, but we haven't seen any signs of this so far. People tend to buy nice food for special occasions, even when they are making cutbacks in other areas.

We expect this Christmas to be marginally better than last year because it has been another good year for sales of local and premium food.