July 2005

by Christina VanGinkel

Sidewalk sales use to be a big event in the town where I grew up. Put on one day a year, the planning for that one day began weeks beforehand. You would see sales associates sorting through the racks, pulling out items of clothing and other assorted accessories and house wares to be placed into the sidewalk sale offerings.

Our downtown would take on an almost carnival like feel the actual day of the big event, with popcorn stand and cotton candy for sale outside one of the stores, and the local diner offering several street corner specials. Other neighboring towns would run their sidewalk sales all around the same time, and if I were lucky, my mother would take me to not only our own town's sale, but also at least one other town's sale. As we often purchased at least one or two items for the upcoming school year at this annual event, two sales were always better than one!

Now, many stores will offer sidewalk sale savings throughout the year. Some do pull racks of discounted clothes outside, or to the front of their store, others just put signs above the racks that are offering sale items, proclaiming them sidewalk sale racks. The savings are sometimes good, even more than good.

Our local JC Penney's has several sidewalk sale events throughout the year where they fill the halls of the mall where they are located, not only in front of their store, but down a complete hallway, effectively taking over a large portion of the entrance to both their own store and several others. The deals are great, and their prices are hard to beat. Yet the atmosphere surrounding the true beginnings of sidewalk sales is missing.

My twelve year old was with me recently when I happened upon one such event at the local mall. Even though we live in a relatively small area, I had heard no advertising for the sale. When I mentioned this to a sales person, she replied that it had not been advertised, at least not outside of the mall itself.

As it was just a last minute thing their manager decided to promote, signs had been hung on the mall's windows and doors, but that was it. As I had not been to the mall all week, that explained my not being aware of the sale.

My son was at first interested, then after browsing a bit, stated that it was just a sale, nothing spectacular.

No, he is not a big shopper, but neither was I when I was twelve. Yet the sales back then did excite me. The ones today are what he proclaimed them to be, just a few more sale racks.

Maybe the retailers should take note of the fact that even when consumers are shopping, when prices are discounted to rock bottom, a little bit of fun and frivolity can go a long way towards not only getting the shoppers into their stores, but keeping them their long enough to purchase something. My son had me out of that mall faster than I could ask how long the event was lasting. A little stand selling hot dogs would have made him happy and left me to time to spend!

Wednesday, July 20, 2005

by Christina VanGinkel

This must be my week for complaints. Shopping with my daughter over the weekend, we stopped at our local JC Penney's to purchase underwear fro my grandson. We had a bit more shopping to do first, but never gave a thought to the underwear as we figured we would just pick it up on our way to the register.

Imagine our surprise as we looked for the underwear and there was none. I do not mean that the rack was empty; I mean the store did not carry any, none whatsoever in any style. We looked high and low by ourselves first, as we quickly found the little girls underwear in the sizes we were looking for, toddler's sizes two, three, or even a three-four.

We gave up our solitary search and headed to the nearest sales associate. She came to help us look, and when she could not find any either, she went in search of her manager.

The manager's answer shocked me.

The store did not carry any. Why, I asked, would the store carry little girls but not little boys? We could not get a definite answer but she speculated that the person in charge of ordering did not think boys that small were potty trained.

First, yes, little boys do become toilet trained, and secondly even some older boys are in those sizes until they are five or six years old. In addition, come on, underwear was as basic an item of clothing as I could imagine! With shopping in our area limited to only a few stores, this was potentially a big issue.

I asked the manager how to file a complaint, and asked if she could, or would plan to offer these sizes in the future. She had to take the issue up with her boss, she informed me.

From there, we headed to Kmart.

They also do not carry the needed underwear in the necessary sizes. They did carry them in the little girls. Finally, we stopped at Wal-Mart.

We knew they carried the regular briefs as we had purchased them there before. They had the size we needed, and we did purchase two packs. We had not initially gone to Wal-Mart though because she had been hoping to find the boxer briefs, which go down the leg a short distance.

With the hot, humid weather we had been having, she wanted the longer fabric to keep his legs from chafing. Even though he is not a heavy child, his typical chubby toddler legs were prone to rubbing. As she was heading out of town to work later in the week, she hoped that she could swing back by a store she had visited a few weeks back in Arkansas.

The small store she had been in had carried them, but she had not picked them up, figuring that she would be able to get them locally back home. Who knew that purchasing such a basic clothing item for a toddler would be such a run around?

Just a note to all the people who place orders as part of their jobs for clothing stores that carry toddler clothing.

Boys do toilet train, and they do require underwear. Make life a bit easier for other mothers and order some. You will be surprised at how fast they fly off the shelves!

Baseball caps are one of the most common clothing accessories in the United States. They are worn by both males and females of all ages. Baseball caps are not only fashionable, but they are also practical.

They help shield your head and face from the sun's harmful UV rays. Baseball caps can also say a lot about your personality. At a glance, others can tell if you are a Cubs fan or a Sox fan, if you attend the University of Chicago or Northwestern University, or if you prefer Nike over Adidas.

There are many different baseball cap styles to choose from. First, there is the one-size-fits-all type. This is a baseball cap that has an adjustable strap in the back for sizing.

These caps are pretty common, and are rather cheap. You can also purchase fitted baseball caps. These caps are do not adjust, so you probably have to try several of them on (or measure your head) in order to find out what size you are.

The sizes are expressed in inches, such as 7 1/2 inches, 7 3/4 inches, etc. These are usually more expensive than adjustable caps, and are usually made from higher quality material, such as wool. Professional ball players use fitted caps.

Another cap style that has become very popular in the last couple of years is something known as Flexfit. These caps are a cross between adjustable and fitted. They don't have a strap on them, but the band is elasticized just a bit in order to give you some flexibility with sizing.

Flexfit caps are cheaper than fitted caps, and come in sizes such as Small/Medium, Medium/Large, and Large/Extra Large.

Baseball caps are available in a variety of different materials, as well. As I mentioned above, fitted caps are usually made out of wool.

You can also find caps made out of cotton, polyester, or a blend of those materials. Trucker hats have made a big comeback in the last couple of years, too. These hats have cotton or some other material in the front section, where the logo would be, and the back section is all mesh.

There is a certain art to wearing a baseball cap. Some people like to bend the bill of the cap until it's in an upside-down "u" shape. In fact, for many years, this was the only cool way to wear a baseball cap.

Some retail shops, such as Abercrombie Fitch, even sell caps that are pre-bent to the perfect degree. These days, however, it is fully acceptable to wear a cap with a totally flat bill. I don't know when this came into style, because I personally think it looks silly, but there are too many people (on TV and in real life) doing it for it not to be a trend.

Those who have flat bills usually like to wear the cap tilted to one side, also.

Baseball caps used to be a fashion no-no, but now they are too much a part of our culture to be ignored.