Sledging Pic: GENNARO SERRA

Finally - shops hoping to flog their sledges did so this weekend

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If you were wondering what the noise was across the county late on Saturday night as the first flakes of snow started fluttering to the ground, then it was a chorus of cheers and whoops from shopkeepers.

Not any shopkeeper, but those who stocked up on sledges last January and have been desperately trying to flog the things ever since.

And finally, just as the weathermen predicted, the snow came and they were able to shift the multi-coloured slabs of plastic and stop them cluttering up valuable shop space.

After several winters where snow has fallen heavily in and around December and January, they must have felt confident in ordering in a job-load this time last year.

Surely, they thought to themselves, by Christmas we’ll have had a downfall, the first batch will go and we can flog the rest when the weathermen predict more snow in January.

But, just like elsewhere in the economy, the best laid plans prove to fail on the glory of unpredictability.

So an unseasonably mild winter had so far brought with it a consumer base who were unwilling to fork out for a bit of plastic with which to slither down a while hill on, as it was as unnecessary as an ice cube to an Eskimo.

There’s a local shop I pass each day on my way in. Each and every day a pile of sledges has stood outside the shop. First the prices started to fall, then it was buy-one-get-one-free.

But by Friday, and with forecasters confidently predicting some serious falls of the white stuff the cobwebs were blown off the pile and some actually started getting sold.

By Saturday the whole lot had gone.

And by Sunday they could all be seen again – flying down the hill with happy folk on board.

It was a punt worth taking after all.