Doing Some Hybrid Shopping

This morning I successfully did some Christmas shopping. It wasn't so successful in terms of finding exactly what I wanted, but it was more importantly successful in terms of being able to get in and out of the stores before the hoards of people descended upon them. It's one benefit of living near a very nice shopping center - it makes it easier to be there extra early.

It is true that I didn't exactly find what I wanted. I did however get some ideas to help me in my new form of shopping. I call it "hybrid" shopping. It's not 100% brick and mortar, and not 100% online, but somewhere in between. Perhaps we could call it "brick and line". Or..."on-mortar" (which makes me think, "Now, Dasher! Now, Dancer! Now, Prancer, and Vixen! On, Comet! On, Cupid! On, Mortar and Blitzen!") Or...not.

I just like that I can do a lot of the shopping legwork online to find out product details and reviews, and even what store currently has it in stock, if I'm lucky. Or like today, when I wanted a specific item, but a store only had a brand of it that I had never heard of, I could come home and look up whether that's a good product or not. Then I could run back and get it this afternoon...if I could manage to keep my children away from the computer for the time that it takes me to look it up.

Of course, what kind of shopper you are completely depends on how long you wait to do your Christmas shopping. If I did my shopping in a timely fashion, I would probably be a 100% online shopper. But I'm not. So I'm a hybrid shopper...for about 48 more hours. At which time I will be forced to morph into a 100% desperate brick and mortarer.

Let's just hope I can get it done during "hybrid hours". It just sounds like a lot more fun that way.

photo by Brandy Shaul (Creative Commons License: Attribution, Non-Commercial)
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