The surprising middle-class gadget that cuts energy bills

If there’s one company that’s a kind of stock market indicator of the condition of the British middle classes, it’s Lakeland. It specialises in very good household stuff – cleaning and cookware and any number of ingenious gadgets (the catalogues are, I have to say, addictive) – and it has an uncanny knack of registering where popular tastes are going. Its annual Trends report is seized on as an indicator of what normal families are up to, and so it’s proved, on everything from passing trends like the spiraliser (courgette pasta, anyone?) to the inexorable move to recyclables.

So, what’s the Lakeland index suggesting now about the British consumer? She and he are trying to do something about the bills, chiefly the energy bills. They’re making purchases designed to diminish consumption. And what might they be?

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Ross Clark

Britain is living beyond its means

The first is simply a heated airer – in the case of Lakeland, the DrySoon Heated Airer.