Are there any fair-call Scrooge activities? I think there are several.

The UK Christmas holiday has become something of an international joke, almost as bad as the French disappearing for the month of August. This year many businesses will be shut from December 24 until January 4. I'm not even convinced that this is family friendly - stuck at home eating and drinking yourself silly is hardly a recipe for family affection and I can't be the only one who would pass up visiting the sales and cheerfully go to work instead. Incidentally, Christmas Eve is not officially a holiday and you might want to point this out to staff.

The main argument in favour of the extended holiday is "what's the point of going in, nobody else is at work." Are you sure? If you have no work to do and suppliers and clients are indeed shut, then certainly it's pointless. But if you check you will find that a lot of companies do in fact have cover.

My personal experience is that where clients are working, they are expecting to be bored to death and you can arrange meetings with ease. Just for once, they actually want to see you and they've got a lot of time for you. There's also a big positive in being the guys who were working, the same as they were. Again, personal experience says that financial institutions - banks notably - will be operational. The big pub and restaurant groups will be going hell for leather at branch level but may be relatively quiet, but still manned at head office. UK subsidiaries of American companies will tend to be staffed - Americans don't even know what Boxing Day is. For those with town centre locations the potential to create last minute product for New Year's Eve events might be considerable. A phone round of clients to check their opening hours is grown-up planning in any case and it could unearth some valuable opportunities. Alternatively, it could prove categorically that there's no point opening.

Even if there are no clients to contact or see, could you not take advantage of those wonderfully quiet days - no interruptions, no visitors, no phone calls? You could spend a day or two preparing the ground for a new business campaign, sending out e-mails to land on the first working day. Instead of having to crank the machine back into action, you'd be ready to go at the beginning of January. You might be surprised how many staff would be pleased to come in for a day or two.

Christmas cards. Sorry. I cannot see one ounce of value in sending them. Did anyone ever do more business with a supplier because they had a Christmas card from them, or stop trading because they didn't? I will bet that, in many cases, the person you send the card to doesn't even see it - it just goes on the wall with the rest. Unless you're noted for a very creative, individual card, save your money. Alternatively, if your customers are all local take a Greetings ad in the local paper, which, cleverly worded, might just conceivably generate revenue. It will probably be cheaper, too.

I would recommend not having any Christmas decorations in place. Excuse me this is a place of business, not Santa's grotto. Being an oasis of sanity amongst all the schmaltz would at least be distinctive. The same goes doubled for taped carols. They drive staff nuts after the third loop and customers are likely to leave if they're hearing Slade's Merry Christmas Everybody for the fourth time that morning. One independent retailer I shopped at last year had a sign saying: "we don't have carols playing, but feel free to sing your own and we'll join in". Apparently, some people did and enjoyed it far more than the recorded variety. I bet they told their friends, as well.

The Christmas bash. If you historically have a client party, stopping suddenly might send out the wrong messages. Equally, if you always have a staff event, it's probably demotivating to cancel this year's, although you should ask staff - they might see it as sensible savings in the present climate. In either case, I strongly recommend you don't have it in December (hopefully you haven't paid for it yet). A former employer left it too late one year to get booked in and we had a January party instead. We had complete choice, it was a lot cheaper and all the clients came because they weren't double booked. We repeated the process each year.

Christmas presents. Aah yes, one of Scrooge's ghosts, roughly speaking. Trickier than parties. My own view is definitely on the Ebenezer side - buy your own damn Scotch. You may, however, be burdened by historical precedent again. Allow a personal experience or two. A former client, MD of a quoted company, was notably difficult but we knew he liked tea and always wanted biscuits with it. So that's what we gave him - from Fortnum and Mason. It cost less than what we gave his marketing manager and he was sincerely touched by the thought that had gone into it. He actually called me into his office to say so (usually very bad news indeed). It was also satisfying to see the array of bottles he had there, which he told me didn't impress him one bit. Case two: a supplier once gave me a personalised glass paperweight. I've still got it, many years later. He freely admitted it cost far less than a bottle of booze. Copy if you can, especially the savings. It is definitely the thought that counts when it's business to business.

Christmas future. What does 2010 hold? Any serious employees who want to see through the bad stuff and grow with you ought to be interested in this above anything else. Do you have a game-plan in place for the next year, one that you can talk through with staff? If not, get one in place - you need it for yourself. If you spend the break doing just that it will be a very worthy investment of your time.

The bit of Dickens' Christmas Carol that people tend to forget is Scrooge's redemption at the end. It's a bit tough to be remembered as a skinflint when you went out giving presents and bidding everyone a Merry Christmas. Well, those ghosts had a part to play. Could you turn the story round a bit and make a business pitch out of being Scrooge to yourself - so driving prices down or value up in the run-up to Christmas.

Then there's the Tiny Tim angle. Tim was Bob Cratchitt's crippled son, if you'd forgotten. Customers like a solid charity story, especially one related to children, and ideally a local charity. Perhaps you could say that all the Scrooge savings you're making eg on Christmas cards are being donated to Save the Local Children. Those Scrooge sweatshirts you and your staff will be wearing would make an excellent PR photo. You will of course have a tin of humbugs prominently displayed.

It is likely that you could develop a virtuous sales tool out of this. There will be members of the general public who would prefer to donate to charity rather than buy unwanted gifts. "I'm giving a cow to an Ethiopian farmer and being Scrooge to everybody else" would make a fine piece of printwear. A tie-in with the above mentioned local kids charity would be a natural. The PR opportunity is enhanced still further.

A lot of readers will be thinking "well, yes I agree but..." The ‘but' is a fear that taking all the kitsch detail out of Christmas will be harmful to your business. I really don't think so. A pub/restaurant /hotel I frequented used to ‘do' Christmas in a big way: more tinsel than you could shake a stick at, staff in Santa gear, carols - the works. When it changed hands to a new group who restricted decorations to a small tree and tasteful table displays, guess what? Sales went up. Note that this was a location where people were bent on celebrating Christmas, unlike your premises where visitors are making a serious business decision.

Finally, here are a few things that you should definitely not be Scrooge about. Taxis - if you or staff know you'll be having a drink with a customer, book a cab. Give yourself half a day to buy something special for spouse/partner/lover - you don't want a frosty atmosphere to force you to work on Boxing Day. Thank-yous - praising staff because they've done a fine job in tough conditions - is valued above any gift.

For more information about Printwear & Promotion 2010, call Exhibitions Manager Richard Smith on 01622 699172 or email rsmith@datateam.co.uk. Printwear & Promotion 2010 takes place in Hall 12 of the NEC from February 28 to March 2. For the first time, the Promota Exhibition will run concurrently on March 1 and 2. Registration will operate independently. See www.printwearandpromotion.co.uk

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