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I was at the mall today, which is October 28th, 2010, and all the stores were putting up their Christmas decorations. In one of the stores, they were blasting Brenda Lee's - "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree." Belk was the worst as their halls were already completely decked. I don't know about anybody else, but its kind of annoying seeing Christmas everywhere when it isn't even Halloween yet, the leaves have barely started changing, and its still been getting up to 90 degrees F in the afternoons. I know the point is to get people in the mood to buy early, but does it really benefit retailers? Is the actual data that shows that stores that put up their Christmas decorations in mid-October do better than ones that wait until late November? From my perspective, it seems that the annoyance of having Christmas in October would more likely cause people to spend less time in the stores until the holiday gets closer, and people are going to spend what they are going to spend regardless of when the decorations go up. All thats really happening is Christmas is being so overdone that its actually a relief when the holiday is over.
Seriously, is a three-month long holiday season benefiting anybody? If not, we should seriously go back to the holidays running from Thanksgiving to Christmas instead of Columbus Day to Christmas.
They started Halloween in August in some stores near me. And now Christmas.
What happened to Thanksgiving ? Oh..I guess that one isn't a money maker.
They must be generating money else why would they do this year after year.
This is where the cutthroating, over-consumption Economy has led us. The over-consumption Economy started out as being a lucrative, progressive journey for most everyone. Now you need over-consumption just to stay afloat.
I haven't seen numbers on whether attempts to get shoppers to buy early works. It could be large retailers start early and smaller ones feel the need to match the behavior.
I don't think about Christmas shopping or decoration until the second week of December. The season is way too commercial. I hoped people would learn to buy less since so many are in serious debt. Guess some people cannot stop themselves and must spend compulsively.
I have a buddy that operates a lighting company...he mainly does highway (Interstate and street) lighting, parking lot lighting, and sports stadium lighting. But he also does Christmas lighting at shopping malls...both the mall itself and individual stores, inside and out.
He operates in 3 or 4 States and that's a LOT of Christmas lights/decorations to put up. With only about 300 employees and a couple hundred trucks...they have to start early.
That said, there ought to be a law...even though the lights are up, don't throw the switch until the day after Thanksgiving! LOL
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