Stop the Early Start of Holidays with the ‘Christmas Creep’

If you think it seems retailers start putting Christmas products on their shelves or begin promoting holiday sales and specials earlier and earlier each year, you're not alone.

The Consumerist has created the “Christmas Creep” to help frustrated shoppers everywhere take back the seasons and the holidays that come with them.

Any disgruntled customer who finds Christmas products creeping into her Summer or Fall shopping can print out the “Christmas Creep” picture and photograph it with the offending display. Disturbed shoppers can then submit the photos to tips@consumerist.com so stores can be publicly scolded for the offense.

Some notable offenses already include Pier 1 kicking off the Christmas Creep season in July with an email promotion inviting customers to “Get an early start on Christmas” and preview holiday fun, and Sam’s Club debuting their Christmas-themed gift cards in August, while Costco had already set out its Christmas tree display.

Perhaps the creepiest of the Christmas Creeps of 2011 has been committed by Nordstrom, which has a long-standing policy of not putting out any Christmas items until the day after Thanksgiving. This year, the upscale retailer was spotted making early holiday references in window displays in downtown Seattle, telling customers to “Mingle before the jingle.”

It’s possible stores believe these holiday infractions will go unnoticed, but now that shoppers have been empowered by the “Christmas Creep,” we’ll all know where not to shop until Friday, November 25.

[Yahoo!]