The newer, larger Menards stores have seasonal departments large enough to have leftover train stock as Hiawatha98 described. The Waukesha WI store, which is two full floors with a magnetic escalator and two elevators, makes active use of all of its space, so there’s no dusty little corner to hide seasonal items.
Also, not all Menards stores receive the same amount of train inventory in October. It is based mostly on anticipated sales and past performance. So some stores never have much overstock left after Christmas.
I have been a Menards customer, if you count the times when I was in tow with my parents, since 1974, and I can’t believe how dramatically the stores have grown in nearly 45 years. The first store I went to, in Chester, MN, just outside Rochester, was little more than a pole building with a neighboring lumber shed.
