Whacking up the price of black ties given the extra demand. Running advertising campaigns for cut price comfort food to get the nation through a painful few days. Or putting your zero hours workers on call for the whole of Monday just in case they are needed, while rushing out a quick line of over-priced memorabilia to sell along the streets of London. There were probably worse ways for companies to mark the passing of the Queen. Even so, the decision by Center Parcs, the family friendly chain of resorts, to kick everyone out for the day of the funeral must be one of the crassest imaginable.

Admittedly, anyone who has ever been there, especially with a couple of argumentative under-fives in tow, might think that getting kicked out of Center Parcs was some kind of reward for good behaviour. Still, the majority of its inmates – sorry, guests – did not quite see it that way. The company made the bizarre decision that everyone staying at one of its complexes, even if they were booked in for a week or more, would have to vacate the premises by 10 a.m. on Monday, and make sure they did not return until the following morning. After a blizzard of complaints, and a tidal wave of mockery on social media, the company has reversed the decision. Even so, the damage had been done.

It’s true that state funerals don’t come around very often. Most companies probably didn’t have a plan for one. A huge range of businesses that you might expect to be open on a regular bank holiday – such as B&Q or the Odeon cinema chain – have decided to remain closed. Some are doing so as a way of marking the solemnity of the occasion, others, perhaps more cynically, because they don’t want to pay staff overtime on a day when there won’t be many customers anyway (I mean, even the most hardcore republican may not think Monday morning is the best time to pop down to Argos).

But kicking guests out? Making them pack up and leave? And breaking up holidays that had been planned a long time in advance? It is hard to see how any major business could come up with a decision quite as bad as that, especially when most of the hospitality chains have decided to operate normally. Probably no companies have quite worked out how to respectfully mark the passing of the country’s longest-serving monarch. Even so, one point is for sure. Center Parcs got it spectacularly wrong – and deserves all the ridicule it received.