Businesses in the town centre are bracing for a Christmas rush when the national lockdown ends on tomorrow.

When Swindon leaves the national lockdown, it will enter the Tier 2 ranking meaning all shops can reopen but pubs and bars must close unless serving a substantial meal with alcohol.

John Brown, co-owner of the Incredible Comic Shop in the Brunel Shopping Centre, believes there will be a rush but has concerns over how crowds can be policed in his small shop.

He said: “It’s exactly what we’re hoping for, even though it’s going to be a bit of a nightmare trying to manage it.

“With our independent store it’s going to be a nightmare because we only have two staff working at the moment.

“The trouble we’re going to have is managing the amount of people actually coming into the store. We can’t afford an extra member of staff to stand at the door telling people if they can come in.

“That’s our main worry at the minute.”

Despite being closed, the shop has been doing some click-and-collect sales.

John added: “This time round it was only us in lockdown, not the entire world, so all our stock was coming from America.

“We still had a very large amount of stock coming through the door every week so we had to figure out some way to offset that.”

But Andy Knight, who runs The Forum menswear shop at The Brunel is trying not to predict what will happen.

He said: “We like to keep our feet firmly on the floor here so we’re ready for it. We’re more than happy to have lots of customers but we’ll see what Wednesday brings.

“I can’t call it. But I think customers are going to be very excited to come and see us.

“Customers will be looking forward to supporting what we do. Is the high street going to be rammed? I couldn’t tell you.”

But Andy does believe people will be more savvy with their Christmas shopping this year.

He added: “The queuing and the overrun high street, people will be a bit more savvy than that.

“People will shop but I don’t think people will leave it last minute as they normally would each year. It’ll be more of a planned Christmas which means you might not get as much of a last dash.”