For many hard-working professionals, reaching for a glass of wine is the first thing they do after arriving home on a Friday night.

But increasingly, it seems, some can’t wait that long.

Growing numbers of train passengers are rounding off their working week with a glass of their favourite sauvignon blanc or merlot – and posting pictures on social media – on their commute home.

According to supermarkets and rail operators, sales of wine on board trains and at railway station stores have risen by up to 15 per cent on last year, as people treat themselves to a tipple on their final journey of the week.

On First Great Western services from London, sales of small and full bottles of wine have jumped 15 per cent, from around 59,000 to 68,000.

And each month on Virgin Trains more than 73,000 glasses of white, red and rose wine are drunk in first class, with another 21,000 glasses of white and 15,000 glasses of red sold to passengers in standard seats.

Over the past 12 months Marks and Spencer has also seen a 12 per cent rise in sales of single bottles and pre-packaged glasses of wine, mainly at shops close to rail stations.

Clarissa Bladen-Hill and her husband, Matt, 39, opened a bottle on First Great Western’s 6.30pm service from Paddington to Westonsuper-Mare on Friday evening.

‘We’re going to see friends and family in the West Country,’ Mrs Bladen-Hill, 33, a management consultant from Battersea, south-west London, told the Sunday Telegraph.