It seems that a trip to the Oregon Coast for our family would not be complete without visiting -- no --not the aquarium or the tide pools or any of the natural attractions of the area -- but the Factory Outlet Shops.
Yes, as ridiculous as it many seem, no visit to Lincoln City is complete without our throwing ourselves among the throngs of people on a search for any bargains to be had, be it clothing, jewelry, accessories, tools or kitchen gadgets. It is little wonder then, that our last excursion to Lincoln City should find us at the Tangers Factory Outlet Shops.
The weekend celebrated not only Jeannine's 20th birthday, but her grandparents wedding anniversary, and we arrived at our destination -- a place where the world's shortest river (the D River) empties into the Pacific Ocean -- and hauled our weekend supplies of food, clothing, wine (not enough) and almost all of my small appliances up two flights of stairs to our condo. Settling in Friday evening, we (Tim, his sister, Jeannine, her grandparents, and Jeannine's sister Mary and her husband) gathered for dinner and discussed plans for the weekend.
Of course Jeannine was interested in going to the outlet mall, presumably because she can talk just about any of her family into buying her something. Her aunt and sister were up for the trip, but the grandparents not so much. Tim expressed interest as he needed to replace his walking/hiking shoes and he needed to replace his worn jeans. There happen to be a few options at the mall to enhance his search: Columbia Sportswear, NorthFace and Levi all have outlets, in addition to Famous Footwear, so there was almost no end of stores to be searched.
Mary pushed for an early start because Saturdays are huge customer traffic days at the outlets. Sure enough, as we turned into the parking lot we soon found ourselves in traffic congestion. There were almost no spots to be had in the main lot, and just as Tim was ready to give up and head to the parking structure, someone happened to pull away from a prime parking space and we, with all dispatch, pounced on it.
February on the Oregon coast is not real warm, and this particular day was no exception. Those familiar with outlet shopping know that these are pretty much open-air, so that movement from store to store can be (for me) a race to get warm. Our first stop was the Columbia Sportswear huge tent, which took up a significant part of the parking lot. They were having a HUGE Presidents' Day sale and judging from the piles of coats, windbreakers, shirts and other apparel I saw walking around (you literally could not see the customer's heads above their arm load of clothing), the store was practically giving stuff away. Tim wandered around for several minutes before he decided there wasn't anything of interest for him, and we headed to our next destination: The NorthFace.
I actually had great success on a previous trip there, finding great shoes for myself and a jacket for Jeannine. Tim did, too, purchasing a jacket and some socks. This time, however, was a different story. I went immediately to the shoes, hoping to expedite Tim's decision-making by securing two or three choices. Tim, however, was side-tracked by a "great deal" on t-shirts, and had several questions for some poor employee who happened to be walking by. When he finally arrived at the shoe shelves, he spent the next 20 minutes examining each style of shoe. The upshot was that he found two worthy of consideration, but he was not going to decide until he looked at other stores. I heaved a huge sigh of frustration as we left the store.
We buzzed in to the Reebok Store and within 15 minutes he decided that, while there were one or two "definite possibilities," the shoes at NorthFace were still in contention. I began to sense that we would be at the mall for the rest of the morning and a significant portion of the afternoon.
Between there and any one of the other stores selling shoes, stood the Levi store. Another 30-40 minutes and about 10 try-ons later, Tim finally found two nice pairs of jeans. At this point we had lost all communication with Mary, Ryan, Jeannine and Tim's sister, who were on quests of their own. With shoes still to be found, we left the Levi store. We were not more than 10 steps from the store front when his cell phone went off and Tim had to address a patient problem.
Fortunately, Famous Footwear was no more than 20 feet from us and, as I had taken advantage of the time Tim spent on the phone with his patient to go in there just to keep warm, I was able to hone in on some possibilities. After 15 minutes or so, I was getting some interesting looks from the clerks because I had been there a long time without doing anything other than sitting on a stool waiting for Tim. Glancing out the store window, I noted that Tim was still on the phone; however, there was a store selling kitchen gadgets across the walkway, so I decided to see what was new, different and exciting in the realm of cookware.
Many of you who have rented vacation condos may know that most are equipped with the bare minimum of cooking utensils and supplies. While preparing dinner the night before, I became painfully aware that our unit was in dire need of bowl scrapers. Well.....gadget store to the rescue! Within three minutes I had five very colorful scrappers in five different sizes for $5!
I digress. By this time, Tim completed his call and I directed him to Famous Footwear. He readily agreed (15-20 minutes consideration) to my choices and only needed to determine which size. We searched the store for a sitting bench so he could try on the shoes, and somewhere between Men's Athletic Shoes and Women's Boots, we found a place. I won't prolong your agony: Tim found a pair that fit; the price was great, and we were soon on our way.
By this time it was nearly afternoon and, since we had made this excursion in two cars, we discovered that our cohorts decided to go back to the condo. The grandparents were looking for lunch.
So what it is worth, the outing was not the exercise in agony and frustration that tend to be the hallmarks of shopping with Tim. Its success, though, was founded on running interference between the shopper and his purchases, and I will carry this important experience into future shopping ventures.
No comments:
Post a Comment