Police were called to supermarkets across the UK overnight following disturbances as large crowds of shoppers queued for 'Black Friday' discounts.
Officers were sent to seven outlets in the Manchester area, Greater Manchester police said, while in London the Metropolitan Police dealt with calls from four stores.
In Wigan, northwest England, two men were ejected from a Tesco supermarket after reports of several hundred people trying to enter, police said.
Crowds of more than 500 people were reported outside other supermarkets in the Manchester area.
Officers attending three Tesco stores and one Asda outlet in the London area made no arrests and no-one was injured, Metropolitan Police said.
'Black Friday' has caught on in the UK and worldwide over the last few years as the rise of the internet has made the event a global phenomenon, with customers always being just one click away from the deals offered by US retailers online.
Britons are expected to spend £200 million pounds more today than the average, according to researcher Mintel.
That's about 20 per cent more than a typical December Friday, and roughly double last year’s increase, Mintel says.
Shoppers who clicked on Tesco Black Friday deals on its website were greeted by an error message that asked them to wait due to the high volume of visitors to the page.
“We have definitely hit a tipping point and this has become a permanent part of the British retail calender,” said Bryan Roberts, an analyst at Kantar Retail.
While the Wembley outlet was "incredibly busy," with more than 500 shoppers waiting in line outside, Asda “have learned a lot of lessons from last year in terms of where and how people queue,” Roberts said. Last year, at an Asda in Belfast, Northern Ireland a woman was sent to the hospital after she injured her arm in a crush of shoppers seeking savings.
News by Bloomberg, edited by ESM
