the grinch who sold christmas

I recently wondered why the heck pimento was so popular in the 50’s and 60’s and a friend’s mother was kind enough to explain that really, it was so nice to have some colour to add to dishes. Remembering, of course, that it’s not that long ago that produce was bought when it was in season and then offered canned or frozen for the rest of the year - well you could buy something called a tomato out of season, but mostly it was a knotty, green, tasteless round thing that was called a ‘tomato’.

Fast forward to about a month ago. Back to school promotions started showing up at my local grocery and drugstore chains (incidentally owned by the same company now). Being neither a child or a parent I was still shocked. Sort of. I did a quick calculation. We were about 8 weeks out from the start of school. Back in my retail days you calculated about a 6 week start to the next big ‘holiday’ event so this sort of made sense. On the proverbial other hand, what kid wants to be reminded of school when vacation is only half way through!

While ranting about this on social media someone pointed out to me that Costco had Christmas out at that time too. Calculating again I pointed out that technically Costco is a wholesaler catering to retailers, so having Christmas gear out in July sort of made sense. Yes it seemed out of place, but for all those who remember the annoying reminder of the ‘Days until Christmas’ sign along the Don Valley Parkway in Toronto all those years; Christmas was always coming.

‘Life moves pretty fast’ and in a consumer driven market, the chase is always on to the next season. But start backing it up, to buyers, manufacturers, designers, colour specialists and really, they’re working in terms of 3 to 4 years ahead, so your 6 to 8 weeks is just the final piece of a very long chain that leads to you picking out that particular tomato red sweater for your bestie this Christmas.

At this point I’m pretty stoked that I managed to work a partial Ferris Bueller quote into a post. I also spent some time trying to track down an image of the old Days to Christmas sign on the DVP and fell into a vortex of old Eaton’s catalogue images and only just came back up for air.

Consumerism requires that we shop when the goods are available, but they’ve also taught us there’s a very slim yet attractive period of the end of season sale and the then not for the faint of heart end of season clearance. But if you leave it too long you’re just plain out of luck. Take it from me - the year my coat zipper busted in February was the year I learned to layer. Now like a good Canadian I didn’t have just one winter coat, but still. And I do know how to sew, so if I was really stuck. Okay, my point was, it’s tough finding a winter coat in February because we’re already into prime spring selling and we don’t wear winter coats in spring. Except maybe in most parts of Canada. Because, after all, all this is based on some sort of completely idealized image of season’s and needs. Now back to the catalogues. Which if they are to be believed - that Christmas of 1908 was one dark holiday.

This is not yer traditional red jolly Santa now is it?

I can't find a single image of the old Countdown to Christmas Sign on the DVP, but the bra page of old catalogues, no problem.