This is a great plan US stores should adopt.

For 60 minutes every Saturday morning stores in the UK supermarket chain Morrisons will switch off the music, dim the lights, avoid public address announcements, reduce the movement of shopping carts and turn checkout beeps down. ‘Quieter hour’ – between 9-10am – is an attempt to create a calmer shopping experience for customers who have autism.

It comes after a survey by Morrisons found that one in five of its customers has a friend or family member with autism.

The plan was devised in collaboration with the National Autistic Society, which campaigns for UK retailers to set aside quiet time for shoppers with autism. More than 5,000 retailers took part in its Autistic Hour initiative in 2017, and the week-long campaign runs again this week.

According to the National Autistic Society there are around 700,000 autistic people in the UK.