Anyone doing Christmas shopping earlier this year?

[Frank9755]

Given the driver shortages and supply-chain issues which are effecting availability of items in the shops, is anyone planning to do Christmas shopping a bit earlier this year - either for presents or even for food?

Are any retailers trying to encourage it? I haven't seen any such attempts but I wouldn't be surprised if this did start happening.

[quixoticgeek]

Check best before dates. Mince pies in the shop now have an expiry date before xmas...

J

[Cudzoziemiec]

There are already "Quality Street shortage!" headlines. I'm interpreting them as "Buy Quality Street now before you remember you don't like it!"

[Basil]

A rather large turkey went into our freezer last week.  We will still order a local free range one from our butcher.  So heaven knows what we'll do with the 'just in case' frozen one if it turns out that we don't need it.

[Wowbagger]

You could always eat it on your official birthday, Basil.

[L CC]

Are any retailers trying to encourage it? I haven't seen any such attempts but I wouldn't be surprised if this did start happening.

I don't think so. Not quite yet. There are Christmas chocolate offers but the supply chain is such that it's not ramped up enough for Christmas, yet. Even non perishables (wine is my area of experience but we see the rest of the drinks trade) aren't ready yet. Give it a couple of weeks and you'll be able to stock up on your Merry Malbec.

[John Stonebridge]

To my eternal shame I bought a Christmas pudding in Aldi last week. 

Best before Feb 22. 

 

[rr]

To my eternal shame I bought a Christmas pudding in Aldi last week. 

Best before Feb 22.

We buy ours reduced after Christmas and sometimes don't use them for several years.

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[pcolbeck]

To my eternal shame I bought a Christmas pudding in Aldi last week. 

Best before Feb 22.

We buy ours reduced after Christmas and sometimes don't use them for several years.

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We have a spare from last year

[hellymedic]

There are already "Quality Street shortage!" headlines. I'm interpreting them as "Buy Quality Street now before you remember you don't like it!"

My life will be no less full if I don't get the Sweets of Desperation¹.

I scan Sainsbury's website for Special Offers of the chocolates we like from mid-September every year.

Sainsbury's Three Bird Roast seems to be an unavailable joke anyway.²

1) Roses, Quality Street
2) Unavailable, despite being listed, about ten times in two consecutive years.

[drossall]

We have a spare from last year

We do too. Home made

[pcolbeck]

We have a spare from last year

We do too. Home made

The spare is because I bought one but Mrs Pcolbeck found a home made one at the back of the cupboard from the previous year and we had that instead

[SteveC]

MrsC ordered our goose over the weekend. No collection slots left, but they can deliver. 
Anyway, that is the major item of our Christmas consumption sorted. Everything else is trimmings.

[Regulator]

We're going to Mr R's sister's for Christmas... so it's on them to sort the food.  Her father-in-law is a butcher, so meat shouldn't be an issue. 

[Ham]

I think all men should seriously think about the implications of these shortages and bring forward their present shopping to the 22nd December.

[ian]

I've moved mine forward to the morning of the 24th.

Though I'm sure we'll do the thing where we agree not get presents and then at sometime on the evening of the 23rd she'll walk by with some wrapping paper and 'oh I just bought a few things.' I should just assume this will happen but my man-brain refuses to accept it.

[Polar Bear]

I think all men should seriously think about the implications of these shortages and bring forward their present shopping to the 22nd December.

No need to go over the top.  Sometime before lunch on 24th will be just fine.

We're pretty hopeless at Christmas pressie buying and tend not to indulge in it as well as encouraging others not to buy for us.  I've always seen Christmas as a children's event and all this frivolous excess seems contrary to common sense.

We've got tickets for Robin Ince's Nine Lessons and Carols for those who think a little (or whatever it's called) and we'll have a seasonal bash with friends at a venue (or on Zoom just like last year) which is hosted by a local charity for fundraising purposes. 

[Jurek]

I didn't really do Christmas last year.
M'Julie from Whitstable drove up to collect me.
We drove down to Dover and helped make Xmas dinner for a bunch of homeless people.
This year, likely as not, I'll be volunteering to do a shift on Xmas day and Boxing day for Crisis.

ETA - The Dover thing was Xmas 2019. I'll be doing the volly thing this year either way.

[Cudzoziemiec]

That sounds like a pretty useful way to spend Christmas.