In the famous stores of London's Oxford Street yesterday the euro makes only a few appearances.
A few hours after 304 million people in 12 European currencies begin the biggest currency changeover in history many British shoppers look on curiously and wonder what all the fuss is about.
In Selfridges, the fashionable department store, Jackie (79) is shopping for a book about cricket but she won't be using the euro even though the store accepts the new currency, because her "gut instincts" tell her the euro will be bad for Britain.
"I always feel, rightly or wrongly, that I'm not European, I'm British," she says.
"I know that it might be useful for people who are travelling, but the thing that frightens me about it is that we will become part of a European superstate."
A straw poll among 10 other shoppers found seven didn't want Britain to join the euro and three said they supported the single currency.
Fears about joining the euro aren't shared by Gary Tse (50), a financial adviser from Surrey browsing among the sales, who says if he had any euros in his pocket he would definitely use them.
"Britain should join the euro because it would do away with nationalism," he says.
While Britain hasn't joined the euro, High Street stores from Marks and Spencer, Dixons and Sainsburys to the luxury end of the market at Harrods have said they will accept the single currency.
It makes economic sense in London, but whether "euro creep" - the ability to spend euros alongside sterling - will make a difference to shopping in rural Dorset or Ayrshire or persuade a sceptical British public to abolish sterling is debatable.
The euro makes a brief appearance outside the House of Fraser store. Volunteers from the pro-euro Britain in Europe group are handing out "fake" euro notes to shoppers.
With their blue balloons emblazoned with yellow euro signs and "Happy New Year, Happy New Euro" catchphrase they are a positive bunch, even in the midst of indifferent shoppers.
Finally, at Marks and Spencer's flagship store at Marble Arch, a real euro note is handed over to a thrilled assistant.
Peter (43), an engineer from Berlin, is visiting London for New Year and changed some sterling for euros at a bureau de change a few hours ago.
He is buying some candles, so he hands over a 10-euro note, the assistant presses a button on the till and he is given his change in sterling.
"It was all very easy once I got to the till," explains Peter. "I don't think it will be very long before Mr Blair takes Britain into the euro."
With reports that Tony Blair will target female voters in a referendum on British membership and the Europe Minister, Peter Hain, predicting that an assessment of the Chancellor's famous five economic tests will be made in the next 17 months, Britain is looking on as the euro is born.
Largely eurosceptic print media depicted the currency changeover as a leap into the dark, lamenting the loss of so many currencies with a mixture of curiosity and defiance.
Pessimism about the euro was evident in the Times's front-page treatment of the Brussels launch, describing the event as having "as much showmanship as a chef with a sunken soufflΘ."
The Daily Telegraph berated the Blair government for even contemplating the "surrender" of sterling "simply because some others are doing so."