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Wal-Mart bringing "Christmas" back

Posted Nov 9th 2006 10:52AM by Brian WhiteBrian White RSS Feed
Filed under: Good news, Consumer experience, Competitive strategy, Wal-Mart (WMT), Marketing and advertising, Black Friday

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Retailers have struggled in recent years to appease all faiths and be completely neutral when Christmas-time -- oops, I mean "the holidays" -- comes around. In recent years, some retailers have even been boycotted because they would not use the term "Christmas" in any way, shape or form in advertising, marketing or promotional materials during the November and December shopping season. Instead, they use terms like "holiday" and "cheer" in place of Christmasy terms.

Well, strike one against trying to please everyone in the melting pot we call America. The world's largest retailer, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT), is returning the "Christmas" to Christmas this year. It will employ an "in your face" Christmas message after religious and other groups boycotted retailers last year for taking all Christmas words, phrases and other related material out of the holiday completely.

The word and theme of "Christmas" is picking up steam at other retailers too. Macy's -- the largest U.S. department store chain -- plans to have "Merry Christmas" signs in all departments this year in addition to window displays with Christmas themes and even an "Oh, Christmas Tree" theme at New York's Herald Square.

Will other retailers follow Wal-Mart's lead and re-embrace the theme of "Christmas" this year? On one hand, customers who are of other faiths may be offended, which was the initial cause of a generic holiday theme so many retailers have followed in recent years. On the other hand, a majority of customers spoke up and retailers listened. For better or worse, the majority -- or the mob -- rules in the marketplace.

Tags: Macy's, Wal-Mart, Wal-Mart Christmas, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Wal-martChristmas, Wal-martStores,Inc., WMT

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