We know it's been tough. We know not being allowed to buy stuff has been hard. But today is the day you can finally head back to the high street and shop with confidence. Rock up and grab those scatter cushions you've been missing!
If you're bored of sitting at home, and the novelty of going to garden centres has already worn off, there's a new game in town. Non-essential shopping is a great way to beat the tedium, extend your horizons and stock up on minor electrical goods, and all without the annoying hassle of staying in and letting Amazon deliver instead.
It's been a catastrophic three months for those entrepreneurs who, through no fault of their own, chose to base their livelihoods on selling non-essential goods. The booksellers, the scented candle merchants, the designer handbag traders... all have callously lost out. In normal times they could have relied on a steady stream of cashflow from customers with money to burn, but instead the shuttering of their stores has destroyed their livelihoods and threatens bankruptcy.
If only they'd thought to diversify into alcohol, newspapers or petfood they could have stayed open throughout, but instead fate conspired against them and their non-essential stockpiles lay unsold. We owe it to Britain's small businesspeople to give them our money, even if we don't have very much of it left ourselves, indeed it's our patriotic duty.
Shopping for non-essential goods will be safe and simple so long as we remember a few simple rules.
1)Queue considerately
Britons love queueing, so will undoubtedly embrace waiting ten minutes in the street before finally getting inside and finding the colour of paint they wanted isn't in stock.
2)Maintain social distancing
Stay 2m away from other shoppers at all times, unless you think Boris intends to reduce the limit to 1m in the near future for purely economic reasons, in which case feel free to shuffle up closer. Shopping in the 2020s is not for wusses!
3)Shop solo
With a limited number of customers allowed inside each shop, additional hangers-on only delay others waiting outside. Realistically, however, the reopening of non-essential shops provides an ideal opportunity to meet up with friends you haven't seen for ages and enjoy a proper retail experience, and damn what the rules officially say.
4)Follow all necessary hygiene measures
Always clean your hands with sanitiser before entering a shop, before picking up a potential purchase and after placing it on the 72 hour quarantine trolley when you realise you didn't really want it.
5)Be respectful to shop staff
They're not wearing that plastic visor for a laugh, it's because your very presence in the store is potentially lethal. Don't worry, they'll still be here risking their health long after you've taken your new hairdrier home.
6)Pay by contactless
Now that physical currency is deemed unclean, banks are hoping to phase out coins and notes sooner than expected. However non-essential shops will be only too keen to take those tenners off your hands, because they fear for their livelihoods more than they fear for their employees' health.
Don't be anxious about returning to your local high street. The virus may still be actively spreading, potentially deadly and have no effective vaccine or treatment, but a new jacket would be really nice to have right now. Unless you're actively displaying symptoms please don't hide away at home. You can't reinvigorate the economy from the safety of your own four walls.
If you obey the social distancing wardens, avoid coughers and are prepared to queue a lot, you'll find shopping for non-essential goods is just as satisfying as it used to be. Also there's never been a better time to snap up a bargain. Clothes stores have an entire summer season of stock still to shift so are praying you haven't started looking ahead to autumn just yet.
There are no restrictions on how far you can travel to go non-essential shopping, so feel free to support the economy in Barnard Castle if you so wish. Now would also be a great time to start buying your Christmas presents, because there's no guarantee these non-essential shops will still be open later in the year.
Shops up and down the country are desperate to welcome you back, and fearful of their futures if you stay away. We cannot allow lockdown to accelerate the move towards online shopping, permanently reducing the number of physical stores revitalising the high street. Customer demand must return to the new normal as soon as possible.
We apologise to the people of Wales and Scotland that your non-essential shops have not yet reopened. This is due to the pragmatic intransigence of your regional leaders, once again prioritising long term public health over the real victims of this tragedy. England's reawakening of the high street is part of a managed return to economic normality, with the need to protect jobs balanced against the risk of killing a few more thousand people along the way.
Today is the day we finally bring the nation back together, one non-essential purchase at a time. So drop everything, hop in the car and come down now. Maybe come again tomorrow too. Your country's very future depends on it.
