Post by lanl ns on Dec 7, 2005 13:56:13 GMT -5
Retailers pressured to get into the spirit
By ANYA SOSTEK
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
06-DEC-05
In Ross Park Mall in suburban Pittsburgh, sisters dressed in identical black velvet dresses squirm on Santa's lap as an employee wearing green and red antlers takes their picture. A giant Christmas tree is visible from the second floor. Stores and hallways are filled with ornaments and tinsel.
But you could hold a scavenger hunt there and not find the actual word "Christmas" more than half a dozen times.
This year, the preponderance of "Happy Holidays" or "Season's Greetings" over "Merry Christmas" in retail stores has a few national religious groups taking action.
It's an issue that is near fever pitch on conservative talk radio, and is even the subject of a book by Fox News anchor John Gibson ("The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought").
And the push is having an effect. The American Family Association, the Committee to Save Merry Christmas and the Catholic League have won several battles with stores already, with Wal-Mart, Lowe's and Walgreens agreeing to change various practices to include the "Christmas" spirit.
Target and Sears, which have not responded to the groups, are now facing boycotts.
"When you take away the name of the holiday, you take away the very essence of what is being celebrated," said Kathryn Hooks, director of media and public relations for the American Family Association. "These companies are making a profit specifically off of the Christmas holiday, but they don't want to recognize it."
The AFA is asking its members to boycott Target, because the store bans Salvation Army bell ringers and omits the word "Christmas" from its holiday catalog.
Since the boycott began shortly before Thanksgiving, the AFA has gathered 600,000 signatures on its online petition.
The AFA also lists nine other companies (Best Buy, Dell, J.C. Penney, Kroger, Lowe's, OfficeMax, Sears, Staples, Walgreens) that do not include "Christmas" in holiday marketing. The group went through 280 pages of holiday circulars and found only two mentions of Christmas.
The Committee to Save Merry Christmas is urging a boycott of Sears for its lack of "Christmas" marketing. Sears has responded to inquiries about its Christmas policy by saying that employees are free to tell individual customers "Merry Christmas." Its marketing this season features "Wish Big" on large ornaments dropping from store ceilings.
In the Sears in the Ross Park Mall, "Wish Big" wasn't a big enough display for some shoppers.
A Ross, Pa., couple, Don and Donna Costa, learned about the boycott from another customer on their way into the store. Though they were looking at clothes for their 2-year-old grandson, hearing about the boycott made them uneasy about shopping there.
"As a rule of thumb, I'd shy away from those stores," said Don Costa. "They should cater to the majority _ we are the people spending money in the stores."
He said that the couple had just been talking about the issue after hearing about it on talk radio. "We're going to make a point to say 'Merry Christmas,' " said Donna Costa.
But upstairs, near the Sears perfume counters, a group of women on a shopping outing didn't understand what all the fuss was about. They laughed over the idea of boycotting Sears over Christmas omissions.
"At our home, we celebrate Christmas as the birth of Christ, but I'm not offended by 'Happy Holidays,' " said Christy Taylor, of Clarington, Ohio. "I'm not looking for a validation of my beliefs from Sears."
Sears might be the only store under a boycott in Ross Park Mall, but it's far from the only one that doesn't spell out the word "Christmas." Out of 145 stores in the mall, only three (Bath & Body Works, Finish Line and Gymboree) had the word "Christmas" on their holiday display.
For Ellen Johnson, president of American Atheists, the inconspicuousness of "Christmas" is a reflection of smart marketing.
"This is all about good business sense," she said. "You don't want to insult your customers. You want to make everyone feel welcome."
How do you all feel?
If Christians are the majority in this country than why should we change Christmas to cater to everyone?
Christmas celebrates Christ birthday and not anything else, stores do not profit because it is Hanukkah?
By ANYA SOSTEK
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
06-DEC-05
In Ross Park Mall in suburban Pittsburgh, sisters dressed in identical black velvet dresses squirm on Santa's lap as an employee wearing green and red antlers takes their picture. A giant Christmas tree is visible from the second floor. Stores and hallways are filled with ornaments and tinsel.
But you could hold a scavenger hunt there and not find the actual word "Christmas" more than half a dozen times.
This year, the preponderance of "Happy Holidays" or "Season's Greetings" over "Merry Christmas" in retail stores has a few national religious groups taking action.
It's an issue that is near fever pitch on conservative talk radio, and is even the subject of a book by Fox News anchor John Gibson ("The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought").
And the push is having an effect. The American Family Association, the Committee to Save Merry Christmas and the Catholic League have won several battles with stores already, with Wal-Mart, Lowe's and Walgreens agreeing to change various practices to include the "Christmas" spirit.
Target and Sears, which have not responded to the groups, are now facing boycotts.
"When you take away the name of the holiday, you take away the very essence of what is being celebrated," said Kathryn Hooks, director of media and public relations for the American Family Association. "These companies are making a profit specifically off of the Christmas holiday, but they don't want to recognize it."
The AFA is asking its members to boycott Target, because the store bans Salvation Army bell ringers and omits the word "Christmas" from its holiday catalog.
Since the boycott began shortly before Thanksgiving, the AFA has gathered 600,000 signatures on its online petition.
The AFA also lists nine other companies (Best Buy, Dell, J.C. Penney, Kroger, Lowe's, OfficeMax, Sears, Staples, Walgreens) that do not include "Christmas" in holiday marketing. The group went through 280 pages of holiday circulars and found only two mentions of Christmas.
The Committee to Save Merry Christmas is urging a boycott of Sears for its lack of "Christmas" marketing. Sears has responded to inquiries about its Christmas policy by saying that employees are free to tell individual customers "Merry Christmas." Its marketing this season features "Wish Big" on large ornaments dropping from store ceilings.
In the Sears in the Ross Park Mall, "Wish Big" wasn't a big enough display for some shoppers.
A Ross, Pa., couple, Don and Donna Costa, learned about the boycott from another customer on their way into the store. Though they were looking at clothes for their 2-year-old grandson, hearing about the boycott made them uneasy about shopping there.
"As a rule of thumb, I'd shy away from those stores," said Don Costa. "They should cater to the majority _ we are the people spending money in the stores."
He said that the couple had just been talking about the issue after hearing about it on talk radio. "We're going to make a point to say 'Merry Christmas,' " said Donna Costa.
But upstairs, near the Sears perfume counters, a group of women on a shopping outing didn't understand what all the fuss was about. They laughed over the idea of boycotting Sears over Christmas omissions.
"At our home, we celebrate Christmas as the birth of Christ, but I'm not offended by 'Happy Holidays,' " said Christy Taylor, of Clarington, Ohio. "I'm not looking for a validation of my beliefs from Sears."
Sears might be the only store under a boycott in Ross Park Mall, but it's far from the only one that doesn't spell out the word "Christmas." Out of 145 stores in the mall, only three (Bath & Body Works, Finish Line and Gymboree) had the word "Christmas" on their holiday display.
For Ellen Johnson, president of American Atheists, the inconspicuousness of "Christmas" is a reflection of smart marketing.
"This is all about good business sense," she said. "You don't want to insult your customers. You want to make everyone feel welcome."
How do you all feel?
If Christians are the majority in this country than why should we change Christmas to cater to everyone?
Christmas celebrates Christ birthday and not anything else, stores do not profit because it is Hanukkah?
