What suburban shoppers were out for Dec. 26 and why
Suburban stores and malls were bustling the day after Christmas with shoppers looking for bargains, spending their gift cards and making exchanges. Nevertheless, the atmosphere was decidedly more relaxed than the pre-Christmas frenzy, as on Friday people ambled the hallways, smiling and chatting.
Just as Black Friday has crept into Thanksgiving night in the last few years, the days between Christmas and New Year's are also becoming more important to retailers, an industry analyst says.
“I think retailers are trying to extend the season,” said Neil Stern, senior partner of Chicago-based McMillan Doolittle LLP, a retail consultancy company. “It's changed pretty dramatically over the last decade for a couple of reasons.”
Gift cards are increasing popular, and people are waiting later and later into the season to shop, Stern said.
While gift certificates have existed for a long time, the technology behind the gift cards of today has given the concept a boost, he said. And while the cards were once the gift of last resort, today they're the preferred gift for many. The day after Christmas is when many get redeemed.
“Today was historically a return day,” Stern said of Dec. 26. “Your sales wouldn't necessarily be positive.”
And with many people's shopping starting in December and as buying much of their merchandise after Christmas with the gift cards, the last week of the year is now a critical time for many stores.
“I think there's a lot of retailers who are still trying to make their plan for the year,” Stern said.
The push of Black Friday into Thanksgiving represents an effort to spark more activity at the opposite end of the holiday shopping season, he said. Many retailers feel trapped into doing exactly what they're competitors are doing.
The holdouts against these changes to the traditional shopping season tend to be the healthier companies that aren't as far from making ends meet at the end of the year, Stern said.
Managers and individual retailers at Schaumburg's Woodfield Mall declined to comment Friday, but the many shoppers there Friday had a variety of reasons for being there.
Nathan Knautz of Prospect Heights said he sometimes does some post-holiday shopping at Woodfield, but this year he was there specifically to exchange some sweaters from J. Crew that were too small.
He said he likes Woodfield because it's a place he can get a lot of shopping done in one place.
“It has all the stores I need,” he said.
Charlene and Allen Davis came to Woodfield with their tiny dog, Chooch, killing time before their flight back to Florida after a two-week family visit in their native Elmhurst.
Charlene said she knew she can always find something she wants at Nordstrom or Chico's.
Meanwhile, shoppers walked the length of the Chicago Premium Outlets in Aurora Friday to check out the after-Christmas deals and return some not-so-perfect presents.
DurRay Torres of Sycamore wanted to return some ill-fitting Converse items and do some shopping.
“(I am) just going to look and see what I find,” Torres said. “It's part of the holiday, the after-Christmas shopping.”
Post-Christmas shopping also is a tradition for Kristin Selund of Chicago and her mother, Judy, who were shopping at the outlets Friday.
“And we did have a couple things to exchange and more things to get for ourselves,” Kristin Selund said.
Selund said they needed to exchange gifts for her husband that did not fit quite well.
“He is not a shopper,” she said. “We leave the boys at home.”
A sampling of day-after goals
The day after Christmas looked a lot like the day before Christmas at area shopping malls, with one important distinction — people were much more relaxed. One analyst says post-Christmas shopping has evolved from being almost entirely returns to being a boon for retailers.
• Maggie Gillaspie, 11, brother, William, 9, and their mother, Cathy, came to Woodfield Friday, so Maggie could get a new charger for her iPod and William a case for his. It's not without good reason they come all the way from Woodstock to Schaumburg, Cathy Gillaspie said. “There's a lot more to choose from!” she said.
• Mary Clare Morley, 15, was at Woodfield with her sister, Joanna, 12, and their mother, Janette, to make some returns, but Mary Clare got a good surprise — a pair of boots at Nordstrom's she wasn't expecting to find. Though a post-Christmas visit to the mall is not a tradition, they wanted to get some returns and exchanges out of the way early.
• Taylor St. Paul, 19, and her mother came to the Chicago Premium Outlets in Aurora to take advantage of a 20 percent-off sale at the Michael Kors outlet store. St. Paul swapped her Michael Kors Christmas present for a new black bag she can use for school. “I liked it, it was just a little smaller,” St. Paul said about her gift. “I just couldn't really use it for books or anything.”
• Fernando Herrera of Bolingbrook was at the Aurora outlets with his daughter and wife, looking for deals. He got some Timberland boots for his son, and said his wife came to check out the deals at Michael Kors and Coach. On Friday morning, his best deals so far were the clothes they got from the Guess outlet.