Retailers Quietly Begin Furtive Holiday Shopping Season

New York Times:

Eager to expand the holiday shopping season without provoking consumers, retailers are experimenting with a novel approach: earlier-than-ever advertising that deliberately plays down the tinsel and holly.

Shattering records for an early start, Wal-Mart is cutting prices on toys in mid-October, but the company is not calling it a holiday sale. L. L. Bean has started advertising free shipping -- but it is shying away from the H word. And Toys "R" Us is marketing a temporary store in Manhattan, but consumers have to study ads to find the name: Holiday Express.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[T.Roll]

Holy crap there's some miserable moonbats in this thread. One of them will be found swinging from a rope on Xmas day. Moo. Moohoo. Moohoohaha.

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Could you possibly condescend to say something that makes a lick of sense?

[neogejo]

Fabulous. Christmas in October.
This will teach the liberals to start a war on Christmas.

[BeamMeUpScotty]

I haven't shopped at a mall in 20 years. I bargain hunt on the Web which is a shopper's paradise. When you can get free shipping - all the better.

Read it and weap - Canada, U.S. and Central and South America will one day form a union with a common currency. The seeds (NAFTA/CAFTA) are being planted now. You can't stop Greed.

[ornery]

I think they'll have a rather good Black Friday.


People are so sick of Bush & Warshington they'll try to buy themselves a nice xmas.

Nothing else to compete with it.

[JScott]

What? They're only on Christmas, I thot they'd be on Valentines Day by now, Christmas woulda been in June.

[A Meat Beetle]

Gawd, I hate X-mas. Now it's starting even earlier. This is sick!

P.S. Please don't tell Bill O'Really? that I said that.

[workingboy]

two weeks ago, local k-mart had christmas stuff out. week ago, they had halloween stuff out, thus creating quite an ambience! soon they'll make 9/11 the beginning of Christmas shopping season. and just to sell cheap junk including toys that kill kids (why isn't the pro-life group denouncing this practice?) don't people have enuff crap in their houses? pleeeeze .....

will someone put the X back into Xmas!!!

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Nobody buys toys for fetuses (Hey an unexploited market! Lets get a catalog printed quick!) so the pro lifers don't care. For them life begins at conception but compassion ends at birth.

[juliette23]

How much stuff do we really need? How does it approve our economy to buy cheap imported goods? When will we address the debt society that has arisen? For the people who recently lost their homes to the housing finance fiasco, I wonder how their holidays will fare. Does anyone care? Do you?

[wm1066]

Anyone in retail and advertising has a stake in how this plays out every year. Macy's makes a mistake and they fire alot of people, except the fool who made the mistake! He gets a raise!

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Good lord, lets start a REAL war on Christmas! I'm sick and tired of the retailers ginning up the 'Holidays' earlier and earlier every year. I say we put a brick through the window of any mall store that puts up a Christmas tree before Thanksgiving. Whos with me on this? If we dont do something they'll be wheeling out Santa Claus right after Labor day.

[ecotopian]

It would be very difficult to put a brick through Costco's windows as they don't have any. They have had X-mas decorations up since early September! No kidding. I have made a vow to not celebrate that dang holiday anymore. Even my kids are annoyed with it. They want nothing to do with it either.

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Good Lord! Is this for real? Bartender, mix me a Molotov!

[Tom95134]

But the Holiday Season can mean the difference between a profit or loss fo rthe entire year.

It's clear that the economy is headed towards the dumper. Even the import tonage has dropped.
>> http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-ports9oct09,0,7945935.story?coll=la-home-center

Now the question is what does the import picture look like for September. If it's down again you can expect some really nasty earnings news for year-end and a stock market that will spiral into the toilet.

[A Meat Beetle]

Won't somebody PLEASE think of the capitalists?!?!

[kellygrrrl]

unfortunately, it matters not how much we spend this holiday season.
The middle class is irrelevant in an economy driven by war.
Unless you're buying body armor or manufacturing arms then nothing you spend your measly dollar on will have any effect on this economy.