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2010-02-09

2010-01-19

Agriculture

Lifestyles

Friday, November 27, 2009 11:00 AM

Photo by Elliot J. Sutherland/The Ottawa Herald

Angie Hollon, employee at Country Living in Ottawa, arranges Christmas candles Wednesday morning on a display table in preparation for Black Friday sales. Kathy Hird, also an employee at the store, restocks shelves. Many area retailers started selling Christmas items early.

Extended shopping season puts retailers ‘in the spirit’ early

Surrounded by Christmas

By LINDA BROWN, Herald Staff

Photo by Elliot J. Sutherland/The Ottawa Herald

Snowmen decorations line the shelves Wednesday morning at Country Living in Ottawa.

Facing a holiday shopping season with fewer than 30 days now remaining and a more reluctant-to-spend consumer audience than they’ve had in decades, Ottawa retailers are laying the glitter on thicker and bringing out the bling earlier than ever.

Penny Hogelin, owner of Country Living, 123 S. Main St., said her staff started putting out Christmas decorations and merchandise in August in anticipation of participants and visitors in the city for the Ol’ Marais River Run.

“We have to be ready for the car show in September,” Hogelin said. “They’re a big part of our Christmas season. They come in September and buy for December. We have no problem doing what we can to get people in the holiday spirit early.”

Hogelin’s staff has erected 23 trees in her 3,000-square-foot shop. Each tree is decorated with ornaments for sale; ornaments that have to be replaced as they’re bought.

“It’s a constant battle to keep everything looking good and full,” Hogelin said. “We had one elaborate mantle display that took forever to get set up. Then a woman came in and bought the whole thing so we had to start all over.”

Melanie Newland, one of the 10 vendors that make up Market Antiques, 503 N. Main St., said they started phasing out Thanksgiving the second week of November and slowly introducing Christmas.

“We’re loosely operating this year under a winter wonderland theme,” Newland said. “We all got together and talked about what we had to contribute and tried to complement each other.”

The store’s motto, “reuse, recycle and repurpose,” encourages the vendors and customers to take a previously owned item and put their own personal twist on it.

“We were recycling before it came into vogue,” Newland said. “We find ourselves looking at things we’ve looked at for years and finding a new way to use it. That’s especially true at Christmas when people are looking for something unique at a less-than-new price.”

Lyle and Cathy Turner, owners of Turner Flowers and Country Store, 231 S. Main St., waited until Halloween was over before transforming their Main Street shop into a Christmas wonderland.

“It took an entire weekend just to put up the trees,” Cathy Turner said. “Then we had to decorate them. That took several more days.

“It’s a lot of work, and it’s a good thing I like Christmas.”

The Turners have 20 Christmas trees in their 2,000-square-foot retail shop. Each tree has a theme.

“We have a cooking ornament tree, a country tree, two western trees and a fishing tree,” she said. “We have birds, Santas, snowmen, penguins and Victorian. I think there’s pretty much something for everyone.”

Unlike her peers, Shelie Messenger, co-owner of Messenger’s Home Furnishings, 203 W. 23rd St., doesn’t decorate her store with holiday items for sale.

“We decorate to enhance our furniture displays,” Messenger said. “And, we don’t decorate the entire store because that would be overwhelming.”

Messenger said it takes her three days to decorate her 15,000-square-foot building.

“I’m absolutely sick of decorating until it’s done, then I love it. In fact, I leave it up an additional week just to avoid taking it all down and putting it all away,” she said.

Because she doesn’t have to use decorations customers might want to purchase, Messenger said she can dress her store in holiday fare she calls “not quite right decorations.”

“I use everything from a Dr. Seuss look to my wicked witches of Christmas,” she said. “I like anything unusual and fun, but it can’t be plastic. We don’t do plastic.”

Messenger starts decorating the week before Thanksgiving — both in her store and at home.

“We have to be ready by Thanksgiving because we have family in for the holidays,” she said. “I love Christmas and it shows.”

Turner said she overdoses on Christmas at her flower shop and, since opening the shop four years ago, has seen a decline in her enthusiasm for decorating at home.

“Last year we never got a tree put up at home,” she said. “We thought about loading one up from the shop on Christmas Eve and taking it home, but we were going somewhere else for Christmas Day so we just went without.”

Hogelin said she still decorates some at home but she really doesn’t want to.

“You’re just really sick of it all by the time you get home but what are you going to do?” she said. “I’ve thought about just bringing the whole family down to the shop and calling it Christmas.”

Newland said she’s looking forward to decorating her home this year because she’s thinned out her cache of decorations and is using only the most meaningful of the things she kept.

“At home, I’m going to use an old-fashioned Christmas theme,” Newland said. “I donated a lot of my things and saved some vintage pieces from my childhood. I’m looking forward to sharing the memories with my family.”

All four retailers plan to play holiday music from Thanksgiving until Christmas.

Newland said they have a big enough selection of Christmas music on CDs that they never get tired of hearing the same songs over and over.

Messenger said she’ll play her holiday selections until she can’t take it any longer.

“We’ve got a good selection, and Dean Martin always makes me smile,” Messenger said. “I close my eyes and see him sitting on the couch with the Golddiggers, smoking his cigarette, drinking his drink, getting everyone in the Christmas spirit.”