Editorial: Let the Boxing Day buys begin

Christmas Day is a time for closeness, compassion and quiet contemplation of life’s great rewards. But that was yesterday. Today it’s Boxing Day and it’s game on.

Christmas Day is a time for closeness, compassion and quiet contemplation of life’s great rewards.

None of those rewards are more prized than the love of family and friends. At Christmas, we celebrate that love with gifts that symbolise our deep and lasting affection.

At The Daily Telegraph, we trust that all of our valued readers enjoyed a truly meaningful and joyous Christmas.

We also trust that your special day was free of work pressures, money worries, career concerns and all the pressures associated with modern life.

But that was yesterday. Today it is Boxing Day, and it’s game on.

Shoppers line the streets on the corner of Market and George Street in Sydney's CBD during last year’s Boxing Day sales. Picture: Jenny Evans

Boxing Day is when the nation’s elite shoppers have their time to shine. It is a day of peak bargain hunting, when endurance, skill and price tag awareness are pushed to their limits.

The stakes are high. According to Australian Retailers Association predictions, Australians will spend a massive $2.46 billion in just 24 hours as millions of shoppers rush to buy both in stores and online.

With some stores opening as early as 5am, snoozers will definitely be losers. Your top-class Boxing Day retail warriors know this and will have staked out their starting places in various locations citywide.

Also, they will have taken it easy on the Christmas Day ­turkey, ham and champagne. Nothing slows a Boxing Day shopper quite like a pre-store carbohydrate overload.

Across NSW, shoppers are expected to spend $790 million. Picture: Jenny Evans

Across NSW, the shoppers generating an anticipated $790 million on discounted goods will be lean, mean retail machines.

They’ll be drawn by our nation’s biggest shopping day, bigger even than Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Those sales days are mere warm-ups for Boxing Day. They are to Boxing Day as a hit in the nets is to the Boxing Day Test match.

Australian retail magnate Gerry Harvey puts it simply: “There’s no bigger day than Boxing Day.”

ARA executive chairman Russell Zimmerman is of like mind. “We are expecting people to come out in their droves,” he told The Daily Telegraph.

None of this, of course, compromises the wonder and delight that is Christmas. It’s just a very different day with a very different focus.

To every Boxing Day shopping competitor, we wish the best of bargain-hunting luck.

ALL IN FOR THE SAFEST DRIVING

Travel is an important part of the Christmas break. In the words of NSW roads minister Melinda Pavey, country roads became everyone’s roads during the holiday season.

Safety reminders should not be necessary, but keep in mind the increased traffic on roads that are ordinarily not so crowded.

As well, remember that safety on the roads begins with your behaviour behind the wheel. Don’t allow a busy and festive vehicle interior to become a dangerous distraction.

And above all, give your fellow Christmas drivers a break. We are all on the roads together.

OUR COASTLINE OF COURAGE

Not a single person who competed in the 1998 Sydney to Hobart yacht race will ever forget it.

Neither will anyone involved in what very quickly became Australia’s largest-ever peacetime rescue mission.

For those unaware of what happened in the Sydney to Hobart 20 years ago, just imagine enduring a more violent version of the recent powerful storms that hit NSW.

But imagine that aboard a yacht, being thrown about on a wild, angry sea.

Six lives were lost in that tragic event. Of 114 yachts that left Sydney Harbour on Boxing Day, only 44 finished.

Yet the very next year saw 79 yachts again tackle Australian yachting’s greatest challenge. And today 85 yachts will set out on a 630-nautical-mile adventure, in weather happily predicted to be relatively calm.

There are safer challenges. But that would be to miss the point. Courage and skill under pressure cannot be tested in the absence of pressure.

To the brave men and women competing in this year’s Sydney to Hobart, we salute you.

The Daily Telegraph, printed and published by the proprietor, Nationwide News Pty Ltd A.C.N. 008438828 of 2 Holt St, Surry Hills NSW 2010, at 26-52 Hume Highway, Chullora. Responsibility for election comment is taken by the Editor, Ben English.