It’s not even Halloween yet and stores are already cramming their holiday sections with mounds of Christmas lights, trees and wrapping paper. The traditional way is to start putting up Christmas decorations after Thanksgiving, but as time evolves, this style is getting thrown out the window.
Since 2020, consumer spending has been altered dramatically due to COVID-19. The image of empty toilet paper shelves is still impacting shoppers today. The fear of not being able to get holiday decorations and food concerns many people who value the time they spend with their friends and family during winter break. Stores are aware of this, and it seems they purposefully sell holiday decorations early for strategic and growth marketing purposes.
This, in turn, leaves the Fall décor looking more like a second thought while time was spent making the Christmas section look like it came straight out of a Hallmark movie.
“I believe Thanksgiving is often ignored because it is only celebrated in the U.S. while Christmas can be shared through religions around the world,” said sophomore Evelyn Allington.
Yes, it is true that Thanksgiving isn’t an international holiday, it still is a popular one here in the US. It can often be forgotten about due to how it is sandwiched in between two of the most popular holidays. However, Thanksgiving is still an important holiday to bring awareness to the things to be grateful for, the simple ones many often take for granted.
“I think [Christmas] should be celebrated after November because if you start celebrating Christmas too early, it’s going to take away the uniqueness of holiday home culture itself since it would be wasted in November,” said sophomore Haley Allen.
Thanksgiving and Halloween are holidays that mark the last moments of cooler weather before it snows, and activities change from jumping into piles of leaves to building snowmen. October is dedicated to carving pumpkins, watching scary movies and dressing up in fun costumes, while November is for eating delicious meals, making hand turkeys and going to corn mazes. December, on the other hand, is the time for drinking egg nogg, building gingerbread houses and making cookies for Santa Claus.
These should be a sequence of events, not a competition in which one out does another. Yes, Christmas is a beloved and influential holiday, but it shouldn’t overtake the other happen to fall months before it.
