HOLIDAYS: HOLLER, “HOORAY” OR HOLLER FOR HELP? ©

While listening to “Day-To-Day” on National Public Radio this morning I thought to ask of America, again: Are we divided or are we, as a nation, divine? If this holiday shopping season speaks loudly, is it hollering “hooray” or hollering for help?

Howard Davidowitz, chairman of the consulting and investment banking firm Davidowitz and Associates, spoke of this Thanksgiving holiday shopping weekend. Black Friday was said to be blustering; people are buying. Yet, Davidowitz asks, was this a weekend of wellness for retailers or was it weak and will this first shopping spree predict the future? He spoke of the blackness of Friday and then the return to a quiet possibly, red Saturday and Sunday.

Apparently, as he assessed the tradition of post-Thanksgiving shopping, he observed that this year there are the “classes and the masses.” There are those that buy cashmere and those that buy the less expensive man-made materials. The classes are shopping and their impact and influence is being felt in the decadent department stores. Sadly, department stores were once those frequented by the families of America. Today these stores are struggling. Department stores have not grown or prospered for six months. To maintain their bricks and mortar they must spend 35% [thirty-five percent] of their sales income.

Conversely, there is Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart only spends 17% of its sales to survive and even to thrive, and yet, twenty percent of Wal-Mart customers do not have a bank account! They do not have savings, nor do they have checking accounts. Wal-Mart did less well this holiday season than the department stores. Consumers and customers are not flocking in droves to the discount store. The spirit of giving seems greater among those that have the green to give. Fear not, fellow shoppers, Wal-Mart, though not experiencing the same seasonal exuberance on this Black Friday weekend will still survive and thrive. Typically, Wal-Mart profits are more than five times greater than those of department stores!

Knowing that department stores sales were strong in this, the first holiday shopping weekend, and knowing that Wal-Mart will continue to survive and even thrive, you may ask why am I concerned for America? Observing that the masses are barely making their bills and the powerful continue to profoundly prosper, I cannot help but wonder of the state of our Union.

I recall those that spoke of a United States of America during this recent Presidential campaign and criticized those that experienced a division. There are department store shoppers and those whose pockets are not deep, those whose prospects seem dark, dismal, and are denied by those that deem us to be united. I wonder and I ask. What is your experience and is your experience empathetic to those that do not share the same? Are you hollering, “hooray,” or hollering for help! Might we holler in unison or will we remain the “classes and the masses?”