New Haven Joe posted:palallin posted:John, your example brings up a point that never ceases to irritate me.
There is no toy anywhere of any kind that "absolutely, positively has to be there on time." In fact, there is very little of anything that "absolutely, positively has to be there on time." We waste vast resources with our obsession with speed.
The system is self-perpetuating, but it is based on a tremendously flawed premise. Only when fuel becomes astronomically expensive--because it will be increasingly rare--will we begin to see that, Alas! I am not environut, but I do deplore waste.
This isn't exactly accurate. The toy manufacturers and distributors have to get their products to their customers (Wal Mart, COSTCO, Amazon, etc.) on that customer's schedule. No one can sell Christmas items after Christmas at full price. Storing stuff to sell the following year is expensive and may not be possible. Nearly everything we buy has a deadline when it has to be in stores or available on line. NH Joe
From my now limited memories of working in a department store (the old Two Guys chain in NJ) many years ago, you don't get stuff in in November, the store's warehouses would get Christmas focused stuff in late summer and came to the stores in September (not put out, but shipped in). Most things are done well in advance, stores make their orders from the suppliers much earlier in the year, but there is a time element to the way they get things in, when they have to be where..but there are exceptions, sometimes hot consumer items explode out of nowhere and they are trying to get them into the holiday season, happens all the time, or where other things are time sensitive, or where because of some disruption the normal chain is broken, like strikes, natural disasters, etc.
