Seattle Sun Newspaper - Vol. 8, Issue 1, January 2004

Copyright 2003 Jane Lotter. Do not use without written permission.

JANE EXPLAINS:

Door busters

By JANE LOTTER

The average American gets 142 catalogs in her mailbox each year. The above-average American gets even more, especially at the holidays, and most of them go straight into recycling. But recently I received a catalog so fascinating, I couldn't put it down. It's called "Barbie Collectibles: Holiday Collection Gift Guide." Well! I mean, the name alone tells you it's going to appeal to your darker side.

The Barbie catalog offers you "the gifts everyone is dreaming of, the glamour of exclusive offerings, and the joy of holiday shopping made easy." In my long and checkered career I have at times worked in advertising, and I can tell you that advertising copywriters go out of their way to employ words appealing to the reader's self-interest and innate sloth. Words such as glamour, joy, easy.

The Barbie catalog is overflowing with such words. At one point, the copywriter simply abandons complete sentences altogether and strings hot-button words across the top of the page like tinsel on a Christmas tree: "surprise, indulge, gift, give, receive, excite, enjoy."

Generally speaking, I never think about Barbie. But when I look at the Barbie holiday catalog, suddenly I fall prey to that ad copy and want to order the Bohemian Glamour Barbie ($49.98) or the Barbie decorator pillow ($18.99). Even though it's all hideous, and I don't need any of it, I'm under its spell. To paraphrase Woody Allen, I'm both attracted and repelled.

The way I feel about the Barbie catalog ties in with how I feel about the holidays in general and all the consumerism. Which brings me to an experience I had recently at Northgate Mall. (You knew this was going somewhere, didn't you? We're just taking the scenic route.)

As part of their day-after-Thanksgiving sale, The Bon Marche (oh, excuse me, Bon-Macy's) at Northgate was giving away free stuffed holiday bears. The catch was, the doors opened at 6 a.m. and you had to be there early to get a bear. I'd never in my life gone to one of those day-after-Thanksgiving "doorbuster" sales, but this year my 13-year-old daughter and I decided to try it.

At five in the morning the alarm went off, and (I can't believe we did this) we got dressed and went to the mall. I'd imagined hundreds of people clamoring for those bears. But it wasn't terribly crowded, although my daughter did run into a girl she knows and the girl's mother. Naturally, this caused embarrassment all around. It was like, we all know we're dorks waiting in line in the dark and the cold trying to get a free bear, we all know we're holiday losers, but do we have to have WITNESSES?!

Finally, the doors opened and we all filed in like some sort of soup kitchen. Everybody got a bear (made in China, seasonal reindeer antlers attached to head). Then, as long as we'd come that far, we trudged like holiday zombies over to J.C. Penney. Penney's was handing out free Mickey Mouse miniature snow globes (made in China, Mickey dressed in seasonal Santa suit).

Earlier, my daughter and I thought we might go back to The Bon and do some shopping. But by now we both agreed the whole experience felt extremely tacky. I felt the same emptiness I had after spending too much time reading the Barbie catalog. Just when we'd decided to go home and back to bed, a family of five schlepped by. Every one of them was holding a reindeer-antlered bear. One of the sleep-deprived littler kids was crying (on the verge of a tantrum, really) and I thought, whoa, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.

A day or two later, I read in the paper about a woman, Patricia VanLester, who was injured at a Florida Wal-Mart. She'd gotten up early the day after Thanksgiving and stood in line to get a 6 a.m. holiday deal. Only she wasn't going for a free stuffed bear. No. She wanted a $29.95 DVD player. Who can blame her? Every year, retailers use the holidays as an excuse to whip people into a buying frenzy.

When the Wal-Mart siren blared, announcing the start of the sale, it triggered total hysteria. Ms. VanLester, who was first in line, was knocked down and trampled by her fellow shoppers. Her sister was quoted as saying they walked over her "like a herd of elephants." The paper also reported that Ms. VanLester was "found unconscious on top of a DVD player." (Sort of says it all, doesn't it?)

Ms. VanLester ended up in the hospital where, it's hoped, she will fully recover. I'm also hoping she sues the reindeer antlers off Wal-Mart.

Anyway, like Ebenezer Scrooge (at the end of his story), I've seen the error of my ways. I will never again invite my daughter to line up with me at the crack of dawn for some ridiculous holiday sale or promotion which, in fact, has absolutely nothing to do with the holidays. Next year, we're sleeping in the day after Thanksgiving. And if that Barbie catalog shows up, it's going straight into recycling.

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E-mail Jane at janeexplains@comcast.net.