All hands on deck for Amazon's festive rush at Rugeley centre

Amazon's huge distribution centre in Rugeley is gearing up for its busiest time of the year, and staff are primed for the festive rush.

The warehouse in Power Station Road is the size of 10 football pitches and hundreds of thousands of presents will pass through in the weeks leading up to Christmas.

In the build-up to the big day, it is predicted that lorries will leave the depot every two minutes and 10 seconds.

At the top of many customers' wish-lists this year are Furbies, Lego, Kindle Paperwhite as well as PS4, Wii and Xbox consoles.

Amazon regional director Sharon Thomas said the company was expecting to handle a total of 3.5 million orders on December 2, dubbed Cyber Monday, the internet's busiest day for orders.

She said: "Over the Christmas period, every single one of our packing areas will be in use.

"It will be all hands on deck with everyone helping out on the floor to get the orders out and on time.

"The five weeks running into Christmas will be very busy.

"Every inch of space on our 'Inbound' storage area will be covered with items arriving from our suppliers.

"At the moment, people are buying groups of items, but as we get closer to Christmas we'll see them buy single items – the gifts they're sure they need to buy," she added.

"Then there's a period of topping up buying later in December.

"We will deliver right up to Christmas Eve. Under our 'Prime Customer' scheme, customers can pay £49 per year which allows them to order goods right up to December 23 and they will get it the next day."

But she said despite the rush to get everything away on time, staff will still manage to have some festive fun.

"We do have a lot of fun. We get bands in, karaoke, Father Christmas and staff will even dress up in costume.

"It is quite an exciting time and we get a real buzz."

A 1,500-strong army of temporary workers will soon be drafted in to help to unload supplies, stack and pick goods from storage racks, and help to pack goods in the business's trademark brown and black boxes for customers.

Goods packer Zoe Richards, aged 22, of Cannock, hopes to make the most of opportunities to progress within the business.

"I enjoy what I do and the people I work with are great. I can pack hundreds of boxes a day at our busiest times," the former Cannock Chase High School pupil added.

Ms Thomas explained that orders come into the centre in three daily surges, described as charges by Amazon.

"We see charges in the evening when people come in from work, at the end of the school day and a lesser charge first thing in the morning," she added.