Dear One Kings Lane,
I received your promotion today. You should be ashamed of yourself! Christmas is five whole months away. Most of us are thinking about the pool, beach vacations, and warm, sunny weather at this time in July. I don’t appreciate it when stores make me think of cold weather and snow while I’m just beginning to enjoy my sundresses, shorts and flip flops. So, maybe you could wait until October 1st? Ideally, I’d say wait until after Halloween, but I’m reasonable.
I’m so afraid we’re going to start seeing more and more festive crap — Oh, I mean critical buying opportunities — appearing on store shelves and websites over the next few weeks. And the music. You should really avoid playing it until after Thanksgiving, and the radio stations shouldn’t be airing anything Christmas until the first of December.
Don’t get me wrong. I love Christmas. I love the holidays. I love the parade of lights in the middle of the winter, when families gather and Lifetime movies abound, but I can’t take it for five whole months!
Back-to-school sales, which once began in late July, now happen before the 4th of July weekend. Costco now places Halloween costumes on its sales floor in July. And retailers like Target and Petco put Valentine’s Day merchandise on display before Christmas.