Lest I get any odd visitors, let me say up front that I like Christmas. It's a cool time of the year. The reason I am writing this is merely to talk about the merchant thing. A few years ago, Carley and I were out shopping for the Grandkids' presents. We had decided on a certain amount of money to spend on each person and for the kids, of course, we were in the toy aisles. Because the toys are fun for me to play with and check out. Much to my surprise, it was plain that all the items had been marked up by about a third or more, just for the purpose of ripping off people who had to buy for children. Some of the stuff had actually doubled in price.
So, instead of getting quite a bit of cool stuff for the money, we got a rather pitiful looking buggy of stuff to take home and wrap. Saved on wrapping paper. Of course, the paper had a bigger roll with less actual paper on it, so this insured a uniform rip-off of the clientele.
Do they not think we will notice that the prices get jacked up at Christmas? Do they not think we will care? This happened several years ago and I started at that point to just give people money for Christmas. Much to my surprise, people seem to like it better. After Christmas, whatever they choose to buy with the money will almost certainly be cheaper, anyway. They will actually get double the stuff that they like, or at least more stuff. Perhaps more importantly, they can buy stuff that they actually need or want, which perhaps they wouldn't have bought otherwise.
It is a bit of a blow to my ego, but the scales have fallen from my eyes just a bit. I have no clue what clothes younger people want. My taste is okay for the elderly and very poor for anyone born in the last half century. I'm just not capable of picking out good gifts. Most of us have a delusion about this. We think that we are like a guru, sitting in a cave in the Himalayas. We envision people coming from all over the world to catch the pearls of wisdom which drop from our mouths concerning gifts. Alas, this is not the case.
Once I moved past the ego thing, I found my new-found Ebenezer personna was liberating. I sat in my recliner and watched newsreels of the mad throngs at the stores. I drove by Wal-Mart and chuckled at the chaos in the parking lots. My bank even has the festive envelopes, for free, that you can stash the cash in for those on your list. Hey, did you realize that the tax man doesn't get a piece of all the gifts if you don't buy from the stores? You don't even have to buy wrapping paper, ribbon, or tape.
About those gift cards you see everywhere. Did you know that a good percentage of those cards that are given as gifts never get used? Did you know that the companies make millions of dollars/euros because the cards get thrown in a drawer? Why not give people the liberty of spending the money anywhere, instead of just the one store? Of course, I can always enjoy the I-Tunes cards. Ha, ha.
Well, that's my weekly rant. Do as you please. Christmas is, after all, not about gift-giving and all the guilt trip obligations which society puts on us. It is about far more important matters. I wonder, though, if the greed of the marketers will eventually bite them in the rear end, some Christmas down the line. I love those guys, really.
From the lump of coal in my stocking, I bid you a good day.
I'm CE Wills.
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