Eggnog before Thanksgiving? Shoppers eager for a new season scramble retail calendars

[October 14, 2024]  By ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

NEW YORK (AP) — After sipping pumpkin spiced lattes in August and putting up Halloween decorations in late September, Samantha Kowalczyk already looks forward to drinking eggnog-flavored coffee and filling her Wilmington, Delaware, home with cinnamon and sugar cookie scented candles and other holiday aromas.

The 30-year-old thinks seasonal flavors and scents should be available year-round. And apparently others feel the same way.

In response to growing customer demand, stores of all stripes, from Bath and Body Works and online holiday decor retailer Balsam Hill to Whole Foods Market and doughnut maker Krispy Kreme, are bringing out their festive collections weeks before the Nov. 1 start of the holiday shopping season.

Inflation-weary shoppers may wait until the first cold snap to buy a sweater or gloves, but when it comes to seeking out deals tied to events like the start of a new school year or limited-time seasonal promotions, a fair number of consumers are finding it's never too soon.

“I want the season earlier and the things that go with the season earlier,” Kowalczyk said. “I want to enjoy it for as long as I can ... If I enjoy it, why should I have to wait?”

Clothing, food and home goods stores, only too happy to push the season earlier to get shoppers to spend for a longer period of time, are scrambling the traditional retail calendar in the process. And this year — with Thanksgiving Day falling on Nov. 28 and leaving five fewer days before Christmas compared with last year — that pressure to get shoppers to buy is even more intense, analysts say.

Members of Bath and Body Works' loyalty program could shop a holiday preview collection of candles in scents like winter candy apple and “Bright Christmas Morning” starting Sept. 24. For everyone else, it became available on Sept. 30. Last year, customers in the rewards program didn't get access to those products until Oct. 3, and the holiday-themed merchandise didn't launch in stores until Oct. 9.

Whole Foods brought out autumnal items like pumpkin spice pancake and waffle mix, apple pear ginger Italian soda and pumpkin spice ground coffee in the first two weeks of September; a year ago, it was the last two weeks of the month. Starbucks introduced its fall menu Aug. 22 including an iced apple crisp nondairy cream chai— two days earlier than last year.

Halloween-themed donuts from Krispy Kreme used to be offered a few days before the event, but now it's kicking them off the entire month. Same goes for holidays like St. Patrick's Day — Krispy Kreme now offers holiday themed sweets the week before the holiday, instead of just on that day, according to Dave Skena, Krispy Kreme’s global chief brand officer,

Walmart, the nation's largest retailer, plans to advertise savings on Thanksgiving meal products starting Oct. 14, about two weeks earlier than last year. Stew Leonard's, a grocery chain that operates stores in Connecticut, New York and New Jersey, expects to stock chocolate turkeys during all of November instead of only during Thanksgiving week. It also plans to start promoting eggnog, which it previously offered in December, in early November.

An arrangement of holiday themed scented candles is shown at a Bath and Body Works store on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

“I think people get the itch when they see the next thing,” Jake Tavello, the supermarket company's vice president and the grandson of the chain's late founder Stew Leonard Sr. “They get excited even before the weather changes.”

Retailers are expanding seasonal flavors and scents to more areas of the store too, especially the now ubiquitous pumpkin spice. Trash bag brand Hefty, owned by Reynolds Consumer Products, introduced cinnamon pumpkin spice scented bags on Sept. 27, 2022 as a marketing gimmick online, but it sold out in seconds, and each year it's been offered earlier to keep up with consumer demand, said Brian Lutz, marketing director of Hefty Waste. This year, the scented bags were promoted to consumers in mid-August.

For the first time this year, Balsam Hill transformed what’s traditionally its fall catalog, sent in September, into a holiday book. Sales of holiday decor spiked in mid-September, a month earlier than a year ago, according to CEO Mac Harman. He also noticed Halloween decor sold briskly in September, a month earlier than a year ago.

Holiday merchandise traditionally has started showing up in stores mid-October, and holiday offerings ramp up starting mid-November. But the big push this year is expected to be in early November, according to Stephen Yalof, president and CEO of Tanger, a leading operator of upscale, outdoor shopping centers across 20 U.S. states and Canada.

Retailers said that shoppers’ interest in jump-starting seasons sooner began before the coronavirus pandemic, but the health crisis hastened the trend when disrupted supply chains led to smaller supplies, encouraging shoppers to grab seasonal items while they could. But some retail executives said they're noticing this time the shift is driven by shoppers looking to find joy during an uncertain time.

“Decorating brings joy and reduces stress. They’re just decorating earlier because it’s freaking stressful right now,” Harman, citing war in the Mideast, hurricanes and political division, among other crises. “There's just so much going on.”

For retailers, moving to the next holiday while overlapping other holidays is an opportunity to pick up extra sales, said Marshal Cohen, chief industry advisor of market research firm Circana.

But there are plenty of shoppers like Jamie Bercaw, 33, from Owega, New York, who want to stick to buying seasonal items timed to the calendar.

“I feel like there is a time and season for everything, ” she said. “If we purchase these things too early, they're not as special.”

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