There are many Christmas traditions, both old and new, and one that has grown in popularity over the last five years is retailers and commentators proclaiming in November that this will be the worst Christmas trading for UK retail since time immemorial.

This year seems no different, with the chair of one national retailer telling the Mail on Sunday that 2019 would be 'the worst Christmas since Woolworths collapsed' back in 2008. However, what the last five years shows is that Christmas generally surprises retailers in a positive way and I expect the same of 2019.

Firstly, these predictions are often based on trading in September and October. There definitely seems to be a new consumer trend of cutting back in these months in favour of spending more on Christmas or Black Friday (which this year falls on 29 November).

Black Friday in the UK last year was a lot quieter than expected, with sales growth of around 7 per cent against predictions of it being in the mid-teens. Discounting in 2018 was significant, and I don’t expect it to be so widespread this year due to a number of retailers stating that it had had a negative effect on profitability.

The second relevant factor is the state of UK consumer confidence and household finances. Most commentators focus too much on the headline rate of consumer confidence (-14 points, according to analyst GfK; zero is neutral), but not the more crucial questions about how people feel about their own personal finances going forward, and whether they think now is a good time to make a major purchase.

At the moment, both of these measures are marginally positive. There’s also little sign that shoppers have entered precautionary saving mode, perhaps because the interest rates on offer are so tiny.

The UK consumer should be feeling positive: employment levels are high and, more importantly, there’s been strong growth in real earnings. The most recent slowing in the inflation rate to 1.5 per cent means that real average earnings (excluding bonuses) increased by 2.1 per cent in the three months to the end of September.

While Black Friday and Christmas 2019 will both see further increases in the proportion of spending online versus in-store, I believe that the overall story for retailers who get their offer right will be a positive one this Christmas. The environment is undoubtedly still challenging for retailers in the UK, but Christmas comes just once a year and neither Brexit nor a general election is likely to result in shoppers deciding to only fill their Christmas stockings halfway.

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