Why do people care so much about the ‘Christmas Creep’?

“Jeez, Halloween just ended, why the hell am I bombarded with Christmas stuff?!

People really get angry when retailers release their Christmas stock early. This happens every year and is so prevalent, the term ‘Christmas Creep’ was coined in the 1980's. This term is relative in nature, as everyone who celebrates Christmas has their own way of determining what is ‘too early’. There is no overall standard — so what causes this nationwide uproar over christmas lights in October? What causes this instant distaste, and why is this distaste often only for those who celebrate the holiday, and not those who celebrate other, not nationally recognized holidays?

Christmas Creep rants aren’t news to you, I’m sure. People hate seeing christmas items in stores early — specifically before Thanksgiving. You’ve seen them on Facebook and Twitter. Below are some highlights of the rants that scatter twitter every holiday season;

Twitter isn’t the only people people talk about this Christmas Creep either — news reporters have picked up on the trend and have done reports on this as well, as seen by this CBS Philly news video.

It’s not crazy, though. The Christmas Creep exists.

Stores actually do put stock out incredibly early for the holiday season. According to USA Today , stores like Walmart and Sears were set to display and sell stock for the holidays such as stockings, scarves, and wreaths by October 2nd in 2016, and in September of that same year, there was already some stuff out. Places like the Post Office sell stamps and greeting cards for the holidays as early as October as well, to meet the demand of Christmas cards and invitations to gatherings.

And then there are the extremes: Places like Hobby Lobby have only have two seasons; Christmas and Spring. This means that Holiday items are available in store for 6 months, and Spring items go out before the holiday is even over. In 2014, Holiday items such as stockings and ornaments went out on the shelves as early as June — beating its previous records in 2006 of August, says the Consumerist. It has been like this since 1993.

Hobby Lobby shouldn’t come as a surprise, however. They are a craft store- and craft stores are known to have stock slightly earlier as crafters need time to get projects done. However, they have been publicly religious for years now. David Green of Hobby Lobby has a statement on the Holiday Messages portion of their website that says the following:

“Christmas 1995, David Green was reading the Christmas advertisements, including those for his own store, and he felt commissioned by God to do something different. Hobby Lobby was selling all kinds of crafts that customers used to celebrate Christmas, yet David Green was struck by the lack of any testimony in newspapers regarding the meaning of the holiday….David Green responded to that commission in 1996 by creating a simple newspaper ad…Before long, Hobby Lobby was placing beautiful full-page ads celebrating the real meaning of Christmas, Easter and Independence Day in newspapers across the country.”

So are we surprised, a highly religious company, has Christmas stock out half a year early? Maybe not so much. Its important to also consider how much money is spent in the holiday season alone. It is the biggest season, right behind it Back to School season. It takes time to prepare stores for that kind of impact.

Is the creep necessary? Does anyone buy items before Black Friday?

Black Friday is historically the kickoff for the Christmas Shopping season, however, with the holidays getting bigger and bigger, are people starting their holiday shopping early? According the the National Retail Federation, many stores are simply meeting the demands of consumers to shop earlier, as shown in the FAQ of their website below;

“Each year about 40 percent of consumers begin their holiday shopping before Halloween. While most retailers do not begin holiday advertising until at least October or November, they recognize that many people like shopping early to spread out spending. As a result, many retailers are putting holiday merchandise on the shelves in September — specifically decorations and greeting cards, which many people buy months in advance,”.

The numbers of this match up with holidays spendings which have been steadily going up. See the chart to your left posted by the NFR.

If 40% of shoppers are shopping before Halloween, and holiday spending is going up every year, where is that reflection in social media, or other articles? If nearly half of the consumers celebrating the holiday begin their shopping early, why is the christmas creep stigma overwhelmingly negative?

An idea for this idea of early Christmas shopping is the ‘Out of Sight, Out of Mind’ idea. Online it is easier to ignore the ‘creep’, and easy to shop around. Sites like Amazon have holiday items year round on their websites- which would be taboo in a real life store. That is apart of their advantage, and how they are rising the ranks and having their own Black Friday deals and specials to encourage holiday shopping at your own terms, from the comfort of your own home. Real stores, like Target, they know this. They know that competition with online retailers, such as Amazon, is hard. Stores have started selling stock online on their own websites to help combat this, with Walmart.com and Target.com. They each offer special deals on their website specifically in order to entice online sales to combat Amazon and others.

Target has also taken a stand to help both sides of the party in holiday shopping. They released a statement a few years ago that they were no longer advertising Christmas merchandise in the fronts of their stores or online until after Thanksgiving. This really pleased people, as they were able to go into Target in early November and into see a large blow up Santa in their face while they get shaving cream and groceries. However, as to not upset people, Target pulled a fast one. They still had stock out on the shelves in store early for those who do wish to shop. They had items such as greeting cards, stockings and lights out in their seasonal section of their store early, however, it was in the seasonal section so you had to seek it or enter it to shop. This seems to be the best handling of the anger around holiday shopping we have seen yet. But, what about other holiday items, like Halloween?

Is Christmas the only other holiday that gets put out early?

According to NPR, no.

Halloween stock is often seen out in stores before Labor Day. NPR writer Whitney Wyckoff shows us that in D.C. at the minimum, stores have Halloween decor our on the shelves before Labor Day. She talks to Marlin Hutchens, who is the market vice president of Walgreen's, talks about how, though drugstores are different than department stores, the demand is there. People buy these season items when they are out. “Some people will complain as they’re putting it in their basket,” Hutchens says. Obviously, there are the people who just complain and wait until they need it or its closer to the date, but this idea of complaining while also buying it is a big part of this ‘Christmas creep’ idea and controversy.

Setting holiday items out early comes back to the idea that stores need to be competitive, and can’t afford for people to spend their money on the same things other places. They need to have new items to sell, to avoid people going someplace else. Items are always put out early — like sunblock. Sunblock is put out on the shelves often in March and April. However, the visceral reaction to seeing a witches hat before Labor day and a stocking before Thanksgiving hits differently than sunblock during March. People attribute cultural meanings to those holiday items, that it hits a weird place to see it when they’re not ready, or when its not time.

The war on Christmas Creep isn’t a war on Christmas itself — consumers want Christmas represented.

Look at Target (again) and Starbucks. Holiday cups start at Starbucks on November 1st every year, and Starbucks have been producing these holiday cups for 20 years now. However, Starbucks, as you may already know from living through it, has come under fire a few times in recent years over their holiday cups.

The big notable controversy over the Starbucks cups came from Joshua Feuerstein in 2015. He posted a video, which you can watch to your left, about how Starbucks was starting a war on Christmas. This video went viral during that time (as you can see with 17 million views currently) mostly by people who disagreed with him. People disagreed with him for many reasons; one being that what he says isn’t even true. Starbucks is allowed to say Merry Christmas to their customers- if they so choose. Also, the red cup is just red- there is no war on Christmas from it. But I mean, #MerryChristmasStarbucks, right?

This year, as always, there is an issue with these cups again. The cups debuted in November and they features some iconically Christmas decor, as well as overall holiday design. The religious aspect were not under fire, this time. However, the cups were thought to have a gay couple on the front. The cup and promotional video show gender-neutral hands holding on the front of the cup. For a religious holiday, having a gay couple possibly on the front was not in the idea of christmas that many had, and the company went under controversy for it. However, not much has come of it — that I can find.

Starbucks has changed their cups for years now, as the photo to your left, posted by Starbucks News themselves, shows. The first cup on the top tier is this years current cup, which you can see hands underneath the signature Starbucks logo. You may also recognize the all red cup that Josh hated as well a few cups over.

Starbucks isn’t the only to be criticized for not representing Christmas ideally either. In 2005, Target decided to take an inclusive step and not advertise using the word ‘Christmas’ as often, but instead using the word ‘holiday’. As we know from Josh, that’s unacceptable. People went up in arms, over the fact that campaigns talked about ‘Holiday Celebrations’ instead of ‘Christmas Celebrations’ and parties. They posted shipping days as ‘arriving before Dec 25th’, instead of ‘arrives before Christmas’, and other steps. There was also speculation around Target that employees were not allowed to say ‘Merry Christmas’ to customers — which, much like with Starbucks, was not true. It was true that Target decided to step away from using the word Christmas, however, two weeks into December during the controversy, Target decided to use the word Christmas in promotional ads to please customers.

The Target boycott in 2005 got so big, according to Snopes, that The American Family Association had a petition to sign going around to boycott Target on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, their largest shopping days, to show their distaste. Since this was eons ago in Internet Time™, the link for the petition is no longer available (sadly).

What about decorating for Christmas? Do people get so mad over a few string lights on my porch?

People have more control over their own decorating habits. According to the poll by Alabama Living (which was the only poll with large numbers I could find — shockingly), the majority of people think anytime to decorate is okay, despite the majority being against the Christmas Creep. This poll was tallied on December 11, 2017.

So, if 51% of people want to decorate for the holidays before Thanksgiving, because ‘I want all the time I can get to put out decorations and enjoy them”, whats the big deal about the creep in stores as well, if they themselves are creeping, by definition?

Where does the creep aspect come in, and what causes it?

The term creep in Christmas and Holiday creep is due to that fact that many times, the holiday season just catches us by surprise when we see it in stores. Deidre from Hallmark talks about this notion a bit more in The Washington Post by saying that we are distracted by life, economy, etc, and lose track of time. It may seem earlier, but maybe were just not there in the head-space yet? there is more going on these days?

But if that’s why it is a creep, why does it happen this way? Because of space.

Stores don’t have the back stock space to keep months and months of merchandise for very long. Orders for holiday items are often placed a year in advance, to account for customs and shipping. This is something that online retailers often don’t have to account for, as they have warehouses all over the country to hold as many items as they need for however long they need. In real stores, a majority of the square footage is accounted to the storefront, and item displays. This leaves little room for extra holiday items to take up the back; causing for items to go out early to make more room. As Hutchens’ (remember — the VP of Walgreen) says, “There’s not a great deal of storage space in stores,” so, things have to go out on the floor.

“What about honoring Thanksgiving?!” Well..we, do. What about those without Thanksgiving, thought?

In the UK, as you know, they do not celebrate Thanksgiving. What does this mean for Christmas stock and the selling patterns of stores? Do they look different? Actually, no. They still experience a Christmas Creep, however, it is a little bit different. According to The Sun UK, Black Friday is still a thing, and it is the same day as the US, however, they do not celebrate Thanksgiving. Seeing items out on shelves in November is customary, and often times appreciated as many feel that splitting shopping over a few weeks or months help to split costs and prevent going broke.

So if the UK is selling in November, wouldn’t it be weird if the US didn’t start selling until Black Friday, considering America is the only country that celebrates Thanksgiving?

Okay.. but I still don’t like rushing my holidays. What do I do about holiday items being out before I’m ready?

Ignore it. Capitalism is ever-present in our country and society as a whole internationally. We will never be able to avoid fully the early start of Christmas or other holiday items until we are ready. The best and easiest way to handle this is ignoring it. If you’re in the 60% that do not start Christmas spending before Thanksgiving, than just move past the items and await your start of the holidays, while respecting those who do want to shop early and stretch the spendings a bit.