Local merchants in spirit of the season

BY ELYSE AMEND

elyse.amend@transcontinental.ca

With just five shopping days left until Christmas, last-minute gift buying is keeping traffic around boutiques, box stores and malls up. According to the Retail Council of Canada, the average Canadian will spend $1,447 on holiday-related expenses. About $733 of that will go toward presents, which is up $53 from last year’s average.

“I was kind of caught off guard last year by how much people actually do buy during the holidays,” said Hilarie Harubin, who opened Boutique Woof! Meow!, a specialized pet supplies and grooming business, in Beaconsfield’s Beaurepaire Village about one and a half years ago. “This time, I’m prepared for it.”

The holiday shopping season started around mid-November in the Beaurepaire Village this year, Harubin said, thanks in part to the snow.

“I think that, as soon as people see snow, they think holidays,” Harubin said, adding that other stores, restaurants, and businesses in the village have been seeing a good holiday season. “I find that, at least in this community, people are really into supporting the village. They really do see it as their village.”

Over in Ste. Anne de Bellevue, the merchant’s association president, Gordon Robinson, said the atmosphere is the same: as a matter of fact, the Ste. Anne village’s new slogan is “J’adore mon village,” or “I love my village.”

“Business, from what I’ve heard, has been very good,” he said, adding that special events in the village are great ways to attract customers while having fun.

For example, the town’s Santa Claus parade, which was held on Dec. 1 this year, is known to bring in thousands of people.

“The Santa Claus parade this year was an incredible success. It was amazing (…) And during the day, the town was full,” Robinson said. “We were all sitting there saying, what did we do right and how can we do this again?”

Robinson said the merchants association – officially known as the Société de Développement Commercial (SDC) – is talking about having more of their own events to promote the village.

Dorval Main Streets Association president Jean Guy Aubry, who owns Bijouterie Jean Guy Aubry, said special occasions, like the City of Dorval’s Christmas tree lighting ceremony on Dec. 7 or the merchants association’s holiday decorating contest, help local businesses set themselves apart from larger stores.

“People are noticing Dorval is putting in a lot of effort into decorating their stores,” Aubry said. The Dorval merchants have also been promoting the Main Street Dollars raffle throughout the holiday season. Customers who filled out a ticket while shopping at participating businesses in Dorval will have a chance to win these gift certificates, which they can use at their favourite Dorval Main Streets shops and restaurants.

“It’s a way of keeping people in Dorval,” Aubry said. “That promotes Dorval business. If you don’t do that, a lot of people go to the shopping centres. We have to find ways to bring people to our stores through different events, and that’s what we’re trying to do.”

John Angus, co-owner of the Le Panier in Pointe Claire, said the merchants association there has regrouped and will put together ideas to revitalize the village.

“Pointe Claire Village is a jewel, but it’s kind of lost a bit of its shine over the past couple of years, and we’re getting the buffing cloth out to make it great again,” Angus said, adding that shopping in smaller, locally owned boutiques has many benefits. “If you’re like me, I hate big box stores, because they are what they are. I like shopping in smaller places, where you get better service.”

Smaller, locally-owned stores can even be the perfect place to find that truly unique gift. “As a consumer I, for example, really like going to the Pointe Claire Village and shopping there, because you’re going to get different stuff,” Harubin said, adding just the atmosphere in the villages of the West Island is enough to get anyone in the holiday spirit. “Especially at this time of year, with the way everything is decorated, there is a certain ambiance there.”