What Kind of Holiday Shopper Are You?
Thursday, December 7th, 2006
The days are quickly dwindling down to “the day”. Whether you celebrate Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, or any other holiday in December, there are only so many more shopping days left until those gifts need to bought.
Are you done with your holiday shopping? At the risk of people throwing tomatoes at me, I’ll admit that I’m done with my holiday shopping. In fact, I was pretty much done by mid-November. I’m the type of holiday shopper that shops all year round for Christmas presents. When I see something I know someone would like, I buy it and put it away until Christmas. Usually, by the end of November, I’m done with my holiday shopping. Yee-haa! Now all I have to do is get everything wrapped and ship out the gifts for those who live out of state.
I truly love the holidays, but I HATE dealing with crowded malls and stores. I hate standing in long lines to buy one item, pushy, impatient people trying to get to that sale item, and carrying a dozen bags back and forth to my car that I had to park two miles away from the store because the mall is so jammed packed with shoppers.
Some people love all this stuff and feel it’s part of the “holiday spirit”. In fact, I know that there are thousands of people who wait in anticipation for “Black Friday”, which is the day after Thanksgiving when all the stores are competing for sales and they offer items at ridiculously low prices to draw in the crowd. Usually, on that Black Friday, (and depending on the deals being offered) customers arrive at the store after eating their Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday and camp out until the store opens at 5 am the next morning. Then they rush into the store in hopes of grabbing their coveted item before the hundreds of other customers rushing into the store at the same time.
UGH. I see this scenario on TV every Black Friday and I just shudder and shake my head. To 
me, those “deals” (and some are phenomenal!) just aren’t worth the trouble – not to mention the pushing, shoving, and the risk of being trampled! However, I know there are people out there who do this every single year and love the thrill of getting the item they wanted at an unbeatable price. But not me. I wouldn’t be caught dead shopping on the day after Thanksgiving – even if they were giving stuff away for free!
So now Black Friday has come and gone, and for most people they didn’t buy all their gifts on that one day. Some will purchase their gifts during the weeks leading up to the holiday, and then there are others (like my FATHER!), who waits until the day or two before Christmas to venture out and find my mother her present. And sometimes, because he waits until the last minute, he doesn’t find what he wants (because everything has been picked over) and comes home grouchy and swearing at the crowd of pushing and shoving customers he had to deal with. Well, this could have been avoided if he’d just started his shopping a few weeks earlier!
Again, there are some people who love shopping on those last few days before Christmas, and I just don’t get it. Never have, never will. But hey, all the power to those of you who are brave enough (i.e. crazy enough
I do have to admit, that even though I *believe* all my shopping is done, I inevitably forget to buy a gift for someone. In that case, there’s the internet (which is how I did most of my shopping this year!). I love buying what I need without ever leaving the house, and having it delivered a few days later. Ahhh, for me that’s pure luxury! And if it’s too late to order something over the internet, I’m a firm believer in gift cards – tuck one of those babies into a card and wha-laa, instant gift!
So, what kind of shopper are you? Are you like me and get all your shopping done before December, or do you wait until the last minute and fight the crowds?
