When we last checked in with Joseph Cavanaugh, store manager at Cost-Plus on Smith Street in North Providence, he was busy stocking his shelves with pens, pencils, notebooks, back packs, glue, lunch boxes, etc
.
That was a month ago. It was hot outside, but the back-to-school shopping season was kicking into high gear.
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So how did it go?
“Great,” said Cavanaugh.
Cavanaugh said this year was different in that there was such a disparity in when school systems returned to classes. In past years, said Cavanaugh, you could count on 99 percent of schools heading back to school prior to Labor Day. This year there seemed little rhyme or reason to when area schools re-opened.
“For us, back-to-school shopping was spread out,” said Cavanaugh. “But things went quickly.”
Cavanaugh said those staple items that he stocked in large quantity throughout the summer sold as expected.
According to a recent American Express Retail Index on back-to-school-shopping, parents were prepared to spend an average of $300 per child this season. That study also reported that teenagers would be adding an additional $108 to this year’s back-to-school shopping budget.
At the Emerald Square Mall in North Attleboro, Mass., it was a good, if not spectacular back-to-school season.
Curt Fickesien, Emerald Square Mall’s general manager, said that sales during the past few weeks were up slightly from the same period in prior years. Fickesien attributed that, in part, to the fact that three stores that recently opened in the mall all cater to the pre-teen and teenager markets.
“One thing that helped us this year was that we had three stores — Pacific Sunwear, Screem, and Gadzooks — that all target that market,” said Fickesien. “Those stores did very well this year.”
While official numbers aren’t recorded yet, the American Express Retail Index survey was predicting that nationwide, retail spending on back-to-school items would increase by 3 percent over 1997. But in the Northeast, according to the survey, parents were preparing to be a bit more stingy. Spending was expected to be down by about 6 percent.
For college students especially, pencils and paper were taking a back seat this year to personal computers, according to a national survey commissioned by Sprint PCS. That could help to explain how back-to-school budgets were climbing into the hundreds of dollars per child.
Wireless phones, according to the survey, have been especially popular among students heading back to college. They are popular because of convenience, the ability to keep the same number throughout college and the fact that a prepaid plan makes for easier budgeting, according to the survey.
“Wireless prepaid plans are ideal for college students on a tight budget,” said Ernie Lindblad, a Sprint PCS vice president. “Parents like the fact that phone usage can be budgeted just like other college expenditures. And, students like the fact that they don’t have to share a phone or split the phone bill with their roommate at the end of the month.”
In a survey conducted for Sprint PCS by Market Directions, Inc., an independent research company, 66 percent of college students said that a computer was their most important back-to-school item. And 20 percent of those students said that a wireless telephone was their most important item.
“Students are still arriving with standbys like coffee makers, sound systems, and hair dryers,” said Rod Crafts, dean of student affairs at Brandeis University. “But increasingly, students are coming fully equipped to maximize Internet capability in their rooms and take advantage of other high-tech tools that weren’t available five and ten years ago.”
At Emerald Square Mall, Fickesien expects the back-to-school shopping to continue. Children have seen what their friends are wearing — and return trips are part of the process. Just ask a parent — or a retailer. And when the back-to-school season draws to a close, retailers will set their sights on yet another busy season. Perhaps the busiest of all.
“Christmas will be here before we know it,” said Fickesien.
