A Debate: Christmas Sprawl

Other people my age have told me my observation is wrong, but it has seemed to me that stores keep pushing forward the date in which they bust out their Christmas decorations. I saw many stores start selling Holiday type paraphenalia after the "Back To School" rush. September people? Come on.

To me, it seems almost like watering down the spirit of the holiday. I am no marketer, but this is how the Christmas Equation works.

• Holiday spirit creates a warm fuzzy for most people
• People are more willing to buy things when they are happy
• People want to get Holiday shopping out of the way early
• Ergo, push the warm fuzzy earlier and in increments to get people to spend more and shop earlier

But on the non-material side of the house, this incremental approach of Christmas imagery creates people to think about the other feelings that Christmas produces (like closeness to family/friends, good will towards man, etc) earlier as well. So instead of having a month of relatively high levels of these feelings, it can be argued you get 4 months of only somewhat heightened levels of feelings (but building up towards the end of course).

I mean c'mon. It's not like Christmas is any where near the coolness of Halloween.