The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1915-11-28
ADVOCATES hB0L|SH|NG
HOLIDAY SHOPPING RUSH
Nina Bull Makes Plea to "Do Your
Christmas Buying All
Year,

Distribute Christmas giving over the
entire year; make is spontaneous and
do away with the crowed. rushing
ante-holiday shopping. That is the
tenor OF the advice given by Nina Bull
in story written for the Survey It
makes plea to do your Christmas
shopping all year" instead of merely
doing Ii early.
Here Is the story:
On the morning Of December 5 n
year ago l went downtown to do a few
pits OF Christmas shopping. and a,tcr
falling to find the sort OF notebook
l wanted on the first floor OF the
crowded bookstore, l climbed upstairs
and had long, weary encounter with
a girl clerk who seemed to know far
less about the stock in ,~ade than !.
did. After she told me that there
was no such thing as : describe. |
eventually succeeded in finding it FOR
mysef-a soiled sample, that is 70
say land then | proceeded to wait erd-
iessly while some one went down to
the basement for clean copy
While waiting l talked with a lady
who had come to buy concert tickets
said to be on sale here. She had
been handed from one clerk who
knew-nothing about the tickets to an
other who knew even less---and lad
finally been directed to the second
floor.
Being very frail she had climbed the
stairs with great difficulty and was
now thoroughly disguised to find no
sign whatever OF tickets for sale.
IT'S is disgraceful." she exclaimed
to me. II never saw store SO badly
managed. No one knows anything
about these tickets"
l suggested to her that this was a
rush season-very hard on the clerks
and as the tickets were doubtless
on sale here only to acconlmoa e
blame the. store. She seemed some
what Modified. but said; AT least
they should have a sign up ut the
entrance saying where the tickets
could be found"
''That."I said, sis up to the people
IN charge of the concert They can t
expect a store to give much 7tten-
ton to this sort of thing at Christ
mas time She had not thought OF
this before. My blankbook now ar
rived. and we went downstairs to-
gether.
Here I encountered one OF the
managers OF the store friend If
mine. and stopped to tell him OF a GER
ts'lil lC(liIs III VII EI KNEW ne HQufu
be interested He smiled rather
sadly, wish ] might" he said. "but
we're here every night up tin IL
O'Clock, and have ben for two weeks
It's absolutely impossible"
Let's do away with Christmas" I
suggested. facetiously. and then Won
dered II I had shocked him, for he
was very earnest Christian
But he replied quite seriously, "No,
we have to have Christmas trade to
live on. But II the public would
only scatter that trade through the
whole year Unsteady In June and
July. for instance. there is practi-
callX nQthing doing at all. It's terrible
having everything concentrated like
this"
Then we discussed my friend who
had searched for tickets. and / told
him what had said to her. He
seemed grateful for my cham
pionship. IT'S these new holiday
clerks he said ''Of course they
can't know 1t all right away. and vet
we have to have them'
And he told me of overhearing an
irate gentleman customer lam baste' a
young girl. one of the new" clerks,
She had been a little careless,' adj
mitted the manager. "hqt 40 very little
No more so than we all arc at times"
With my usual contrariety, I now
took the other side. "Of COURSE" I