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Has Christmas Shopping Started?

KATHY WATERS/HIGHLANDS TODAY

Roy Sykes and his sister, Frances Williams, shop for holiday decorations on Monday at Wal-Mart in Sebring. Williams said she got a head start to get the decorations she wanted and also to spread out her budget for holiday spending.

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By MANDY SHEETS | Highlands Today

Published: November 6, 2007

SEBRING — It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and it's barely November.
Decorations hang in the stores, commercials advertise the latest toys and Santa Claus even made his first appearance of the season at Wal-Mart on Saturday.

Frances Williams and her brother Ron Sykes spent Monday morning shopping for trimmings for their Christmas tree.

"We wanted to buy everything while it's still in stock," Williams said, as she loaded blue ornaments into her shopping cart. "They have it out, so why not get it and avoid the rush … But we won't put up the tree until after Thanksgiving."

Dolores Bowman, of Sebring, picked out Christmas cards Monday morning to send to 100 friends and family members.
"I have to write something special on each one for each person, so I like to start early," Bowman said.

Gene Gauger, assistant manager of the Christmas store in Wal-Mart, said customers have differing opinions about Christmas music playing before even Halloween has passed.
"We get some mixed reviews," Gauger said. "Some say they don't like Christmas so soon, but some are happy to have a long holiday season."

In an effort to get customers thinking about Christmas shopping early, Wal-Mart is jump starting its season with secret in-store specials leading up to Black Friday for five of the most sought after gifts.
Nancy Jarvis, assistant manager of Wal-Mart, said the sales are so secret even employees don't find out what will be featured before the general public. Wal-Mart reveals the items on sale on its Web site Thursday and the sale begins at 8 a.m. Friday.

The first sale featured a laptop for $348, a high-definition DVD player for $98, a 50-inch plasma television for $998, high-definition DVDs for $14 and a Fisher-Price NASCAR model for $144.
"It went really well, and we had some items go really fast," Jarvis said.

Although Wal-Mart's Christmas store was busy with shoppers Monday morning, their carts were full of decorations items instead of gifts.

Williams said she spaces out her shopping trips, starting with buying décor and then buying presents later, so the economic impact isn't so great at one time.

"We have to live within a budget, so we shop early and then the spending doesn't all happen at once," Williams said. "If we waited until the last minute, we may run out of money."

Gauger said the early holiday sales are aimed at the budget shoppers who want to find good bargains.
"Everyone is struggling for cash right now with gas prices and the general state of the economy, so we are trying to save our customers some money," Gauger said.

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