LIHU’E – It could have been pre-Christmas or pre-hurricane, but parking lots were full from one end of town to the other yesterday. Eager, early-bird shoppers were taking advantage of pre-dawn savings, knowing shelves would be well-stocked. Shoppers also were
LIHU’E – It could have been pre-Christmas or pre-hurricane, but parking lots
were full from one end of town to the other yesterday.
Eager, early-bird
shoppers were taking advantage of pre-dawn savings, knowing shelves would be
well-stocked. Shoppers also were curious to experience the expanded Sears store
at Kukui Grove Center.
The mantra was “put it on the card,” as a longer
shopping season, apparently some disposable income to part with, the
day-after-Thanksgiving deals and selections, and other conditions collided to
bring Kauaians to the stores in what merchants are fairly certain is a rocking
start to a very good holiday season.
“I’m optimistic about the sales
opportunities at both locations,” said Wade Lord, who manages Kaua’i Village
Shopping Center in Waipouli and Kukui Grove Center.
“I think they are,” he
responded when asked if the early-birds out yesterday were smart shoppers. At
Kukui Grove, lots of shoppers with lots of bags meant the start of a good
season, Lord ascertained.
While Kukui Grove is what Lord calls “a prototype
regional mall,” over at Kaua’i Village, with more of a visitor bent, sales
figures fluctuate based largely on the island’s visitor counts.
Both
centers, though, experience a “December surge” in sales, he said.
The
larger department stores – not accidentally placed at either end of Lihu’e town
– need to turn over inventory rapidly, and figure if they get you in for a sale
item, it’s likely you’ll buy something else while you’re there, Lord
said.
There are several options placed before shoppers, including
e-commerce, catalogs, neighborhood stores and regional malls. On an island with
limited shopping opportunities, there is even jetting off to the metropolis of
Honolulu, he said.
The customer benefits from the convenience of shopping
in the 21st century, and the retailer is challenged by the various ways to get
into the minds of those shoppers.
In the retail business, the varied ways
to reach customers are called “channels,” and the companies most successful are
those offering multiple ways (TV, radio, Internet, newspaper, catalog, etc.) to
get their messages out.
Basically, the more times people are exposed to
your product, the better the likelihood that they’ll remember it, retailers
say.
“There’s a world of opportunities for retail to be successful,” Lord
said.
At Kaua’i Village, it’s fairly straightforward: If visitor counts are
up and tenants have goods people want to purchase, they’ll do
well.
Throughout Kukui Grove, the word is that the economy is still doing
well, with what Lord calls “pockets of despair,” the closing of Amfac Sugar
Kaua’i first and foremost among them.
For all retailers on the island, if
marketing and leasing efforts work, if stores do a good job of offering needed
items and retailers are successful in selling, it’ll be a green Christmas, Lord
concluded.
Starting yesterday, holiday shoppers are expected to put over $1
trillion in U.S. purchases on their credit cards before Christmas, including an
estimated $625 million in Hawai’i.
Several states will see credit-card
purchases exceed $1 billion, led by California’s $16.2 billion.
Last year,
consumers charged $92.6 billion between Thanksgiving and Christmas on the four
dominant credit cards: VISA, MasterCard, American Express and Discover.
A
longer shopping season (31 days, if you’re counting) and rising overall credit
card usage are the reasons the country will top $1 trillion, according to
CardWeb.com Inc.
Online shopping will grow in popularity this season, and a
Code of Online Business Practices has recently been finalized for merchants and
consumers. The Better Business Bureau is participating in the project, at
www.bbbonline.org.
Geared to increase consumer confidence in the e-commerce
process, the code has truthful and accurate communications, disclosure,
information practices and security, customer satisfaction and protection of
children as its basic principles.
The International Council of Shopping
Centers wishes to dispel once and for all the myth that the day after
Thanksgiving is the busiest shopping day of the year.
For the past decade,
it has been whatever day is the last Saturday before Christmas. Those
procrastinators often don’t have a lot to choose from, though, Lord
said.
Staff Writer Paul C. Curtis can be reached at [
HREF=”mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net”>pcurtis@pulitzer.net] or 245-3681 (ext.
224).
