Enough about the supply chain ruining the big day. It’s the Holiday season again. Never has it been more important to rally behind small businesses than now. Rather than buying the latest and greatest things on everyone’s list this season, support a small business by purchasing an awesome alternative to this year’s hot ticket items.
Here are 6 of the most-requested gifts this holiday season and equally excellent items to substitute when you shop with a small business.
Buy This Present: A Family-Friendly Board Game - Not That: A PS5
Back in the day, when all gifts had to be bought in stores, retailers would helpfully remind us how many “shopping days” there were left before Christmas - not counting the Sundays, and often Saturdays, when stores were closed. Now, in the age of the Internet, every day can be a shopping day, and store hours are any time we’re awake.
However, that doesn’t mean you can just put off all your shopping until the last minute. Because the snag with doing your Christmas shopping online is, you have to factor in delivery time to be sure your gift will arrive before Santa takes off for the year. So instead of counting shopping days until Christmas, you have to count shipping days.
Fortunately, BuyVia has taken the work out of counting for you. We’ve checked websites for all the major stores to see how long their expected delivery times are for regular shipping, express shipping, and free shipping. If a store doesn’t have this information on the Web, or the information is conflicting, we’ve called customer service to get the scoop or extrapolated from the previous year - so you can just relax and enjoy your eggnog. (more…)
The holiday shopping season is in full swing, and December is usually a month long sales-fest. And while that may sound like an awesome deal for consumers, retailers expect an increase in sales this year - and not because the economy is recovering. Rather, they are counting on an endless onslaught of offers - everything from free shipping to holiday countdowns, to wear people out to the point of just grabbing the first good deal they spot as they enter a store.
The truth is this: many products you see on sale during the Christmas rush will be offered at significantly larger discounts after the holidays. Sure, you probably don’t want to be passing out gifts after Christmas has come and gone, but if you happen to be shopping for yourself, we’ve put together a list of tips and strategies for stretching every last dollar in your budget after the holidays.
