Christmas sales up some, down some

Shopping reaches a high point during the Christmas season, traditionally starting on Black Friday, and remains steady through Christmas as people wrap up their holiday shopping. With Christmas day falling on a Sunday this year sales weren't as high for some as they had hoped, while others saw a spike in activity and customer traffic.

Many locally owned businesses, especially in the Downtown area, saw a drop in traffic due to the holiday being on a Sunday and then being closed on Monday.

"We really kind of slowed down as Saturday hit," said Neil Burge, owner of Day's Mens Store and Burge's Shoe Center, "We had our best day on Friday, but then traffic really dropped on Saturday and we were closed on Monday."

Where other stores in the downtown area saw similar patterns, one store in particular stayed very busy during those last few shopping days.

"We were really busy this weekend," said Kim Fowler of Glenda's Hallmark, "It was packed in here Friday and Saturday. Then on Monday we were the only ones open downtown."

Fowler says they stayed busy Monday due to a sale they were having but might have seen a larger number of customers had more stores been open.

Some of the bigger retailers saw a jump in customer traffic this year, partially due to Christmas Eve being on a Saturday, according to JC Penney manager Barbara Bradley.

"We had quite a bit of activity this weekend, and we really appreciate the customers who shopped locally," said Bradley, "We had a good amount of activity Friday and Saturday, especially since Christmas Eve was on a Saturday. It gave us an extra day. Monday was a really big day for us too. We opened at 6 a.m. and stayed busy throughout the day."

Wal-Mart too saw a good week in sales leading up to Christmas.

"Sales were really good for us this year, we even surpassed last year's sales. We had great numbers all week leading up to Sunday. Of course Sunday was a little slower, but over all it was good. Monday is usually a big day for returns, but we were actually down in returns from last year, which is good for us," said Mark Brown, manager at Wal-Mart.

Though a few of the smaller shops in town saw a decline in shopping on Saturday and Monday, especially with many of them closed Monday, overall the weekend seemed to post good numbers for retailers in the area.

cpinkard@blythevillecourier.com