Sales of home fertility monitors and pregnancy tests have soared by 60 per cent since the Duchess of Cambridge announced her baby news.
As Kate and Prince William gear up for the pitter-patter of royal feet, Clearblue has witnessed its biggest rise in almost five years in sales of its home fertility monitor and test stick packs in Boots retailers nationwide.
Now, as er, weird as it may be to jump on a pregnancy bandwagon, it seems there were similar predictions when Princess Diana announced her second pregnancy in 1984.
Doing a Kate? Clearblue fertility products have experienced a 60 per cent increase in sales since the announcement of a bun in the royal oven
Ahead of Prince Harry’s birth in 1984, British gynaecologist Harold Francis predicted a baby boom, speculating an extra 60,000 British women would become mothers-to-be.
He told the Associated Press: “Princess Diana has to realise that she is a trend-setter and whatever she does a lot of young brides will emulate.”
Clearblue UK Brand Manager Hugh Ayling said: “We’ve never seen an increase like this before. We were pretty stunned when the stats came in and we wondered why it was. Then we worked it back and saw the spike came after Kate made her announcement.
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“It would seem that women are trying for a baby in the hope of experiencing their pregnancy alongside Kate.”
FYI, sociologists are also predicting other reasons for an expected baby boom in 2013 - including the Olympics, the Jubilee, Andy Murray's big game... and the S&M novel Fifty Shades of Grey.
Yep, according to the Evening Standard, 2013 is also set to be a bumper year for bumps largely thanks to "an inexpertly written piece of erotic fiction".
So, whether it was the Duchess of Cambridge's intense morning sickness, Andy Murray's courtside grunting or Christian Grey's predilection for bondage and domination that saw you lie back and think of England, Britain is apparently about to see the biggest baby boom for 40 years.