As Amazon opens a ‘guerrilla shop’, have our high streets lost the war?

The internet giant will have a real store in London for Black Friday. In this topsy-turvy retail world, innovation is now a necessity

On London's Oxford Street a row of glittering snowflakes guides shoppers along the golden mile of fashion and department stores. The 750,000 lights floating above Selfridges, John Lewis and Debenhams are a decades-old tradition but events like Black Friday have changed Christmas shopping for ever.

The UK high street has just experienced something of a watershed, what some have called its "Tesla moment". Online fashion website Asos overtook Marks & Spencer in market value terms for the first time despite not having a single store to its name. The comparison with the automotive industry comes because electric carmaker Tesla moved ahead of the 114-year-old Ford Motor Company in market value earlier this year.