It’s 8am and you’re late for work. You rush into the kitchen for a bowl of cereal only to find you’ve run out of milk. At that moment the doorbell rings. It’s a delivery of groceries that you didn’t order, including a carton of milk. That’s the future according to Poppy and Amazon Dash.

Spending big on products intended for short-term use is crucial in revealing how confident a country’s population is in their own economic prospects. So when people start splashing cash on things that they literally flush down the toilet, it's probably a signifier of a healthy economy.

Anticipating customers' purchasing decisions before they’ve even made them, Amazon has patented a process called 'anticipatory package shipping'. Products would be sent to centres located near the people who Amazon thinks are most likely to buy them.

With the spread of technology, companies are exploring the ways household chores can be made more bearable. Amazon is appealing to grocery-hating mothers everywhere with Amazon Dash – the kitchen assistant intended to do for the shopping list what Kindle did for the e-book.