The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century

First came the bacon flowchart, now this:

Click the flowchart to see it at full size.
Image courtesy of Miss Fipi Lele.

In the previous post, I praised Nordstrom for showing some restraint with the Christmas marketing.

On the other end of the shopping spectrum is Sears, who are doing two even bigger and better things:

• For any employees who’ve been called up to serve in the war, Sears is voluntarily paying the difference in salaries and maintaining all benefits, including medical insurance and bonus programs, for up to two years. This is above and beyond what most employers will do.
• Sears will make a donation to Heroes at Home — a charity that helps military families and veterans in need across America by making necessary repairs, improvements or modifications to their homes — for every credit card purchase made at any of its Sears stores from November 9 to December 28 up to $1 million, and for every gift card purchased during that time up to $100,000.

My internet friend Miss Fipi Lele sent me this very encouraging photo:

Photo courtesy of Miss Fipi Lele.

It reads:

At Nordstrom, we won’t be decking the halls until Friday, November 23rd. Why? Well, we just like the idea of celebrating one holiday at a time.

From our family to yours, Happy Thanksgiving.

Nordstrom will be closed Thanksgiving Day. On Friday, our doors will be open to welcome the new season.

I’d rather they waited until December 1st to start the Christmas promos, but at a time when the stores crank up their Christmas marketing engines as soon as Hallowe’en passes (a tendency for which President Roosevelt has to accept at least some of the blame), it’s an improvement. Stretching the Christmas season cheapens the holiday for those of us who celebrate it and annoys those who don’t.

There were already good reasons to shop at Nordstrom — top-shelf stuff and killer service — but here’s an extra one. Kudos, Nordstrom!