Published: December 22, 2007 12:47 am         

My shopping’s finished; how about yours?

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve. Do you have your holiday shopping finished?

There has been more than one holiday eve when I haven’t completed my shopping in the past, but not this year.

Actually, I wrapped it up pretty early this time, picking up things throughout the year on our travels around the country that we thought people would like.

I don’t like waiting until the last minute because Christmas Eve is for celebrating what Christmas is all about, not shopping.

But if there are still folks on your holiday list, stores will be open late and some will be offering some really good last-minute sales.

I remember a next door neighbor I once had who never shopped until Christmas Eve. He would hit all the department stores, sometimes around midnight, doing all of his kids’ Santa shopping.

He would then come home with all his purchases, often big ticket items like bicycles, electronic games, complicated doll houses and other things that had to be put together before the tots crept downstairs on Christmas morning.

He would be up until the crack of dawn ... just before the kids awoke ... assembling and wrapping the gifts and arranging them just so under the Christmas tree.

By the time the kids had begun the unwrapping process he was pretty much zonked for the day.

On Christmas morning the unwrapping is really one of the most fun things and my husband continually finds new ways to wrap packages that make them as much fun to open as what might be inside.

One year, he tried to disguise a guitar for one of his grandsons. The package was monstrous — bigger than the child, who stood in awe and looked at it for a while before deciding how to tackle it. Once the guitar was out in the open, the package became a playhouse for one of the smaller kids.

For those of you who may still be wandering the store aisles, Consumer Reports and its companion magazine ShopSmart has some suggestions.

Gift cards are great for the last minute but if a card goes unused for a long enough period of time, there might be nothing left. The companies issuing the cards often begin deducting monthly service fees if the card is not used within a specified period.

Carefully read the fine print.

Take careful note, too, with gift cards you buy. If the scratch-off coating over the PIN has been removed, a thief may actually have already used the card information to buy something.

When shopping now there are lots of end-of-season sales to take advantage of, but be careful about how you consider a sale price.

Some department stores have a tendency to inflate the manufacturer’s suggested retail price in order to advertise a larger percentage off.

As a Fiestaware collector I watch the prices at the local department store that carries it. A place setting is often on sale at $24.99, noting a substantial savings over a $43 retail price. I’ve never seen the place setting sell for more than $29.99 at any retail store, and as a collector, I often get the place settings at the factory outlet store for $19.99.

SmartShop cited some other instances at Kohl’s, Macy’s and Sears where items were marked at a sale price indicating a 50 percent or more savings over retail but when the numbers utilizing the manufacturer’s suggested retail and the sale prices were crunched, the actual discounts dropped to zero at Sears on both items compared, rather than the 13 and 17 percent savings advertised.

Macy’s items included an iron and a 45-piece place setting of Mikasa dinnerware. The Mikasa came closest to the 53 percent savings advertised at 46 percent off the manufacturer’s price. The iron was only reduced by 17 percent.

The items at Kohl’s that were compared were a cutlery set and a convection oven. The knives were advertised at a 55 percent savings over the actual savings of 24 percent and the oven at a 48 percent savings over the actual 40 percent savings.

It’s not dishonest but simply the retail price the store would charge if they could sell it at that price.

Guess that’s why we read Consumer’s Digest, SmartShop and other similar publications to help us be more savvy shoppers ... no matter what the season.

Merry Christmas!

Contact Mona Ridder at mridder@times-news.com.