Friday, January 18, 2008
Winter gear dusted off
Drier winters have meant lower sales for area retailers, but Thursday's snowfall helped.
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Eric Brady | The Roanoke Times
On the day of the region’s first big snowfall, Anthony Ferrell (left) and his brother, Deandrio Sanders, buy shovels at Northwest True Value Hardware in Roanoke.
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Last year's practically snowless winter didn't inspire Eddie Green to buy a new sled.
But Thursday, with the Roanoke area's first significant snowfall of the year, Green arrived ready to purchase a plastic model at Northwest True Value Hardware in Roanoke.
Green, his girlfriend and the couple's 4-year-old daughter already had tried Wal-Mart and Lowe's Home Improvement. Green couldn't find sleds at either store.
At Northwest, they didn't find the newest sled models. The retailer's sleds and other snow equipment have been carried over since the winter of 2005, "the last year that we sold all of our supplies," said Northwest owner Charles Overstreet.
Mild winter temperatures in parts of the country are contributing to a slow extinction of this winter toy that for generations has whizzed children and adults down snow blanketed hills for a thrilling ride.
With outside temperatures during the past few winters trending milder in the Roanoke Valley -- 2007 was the warmest year on record in Roanoke -- snowy weather equipment, such as sleds and shovels, haven't sold well at some local stores.
For this reason, retailers such as Northwest have hoarded leftover supplies in storage areas, praying for a snowy day.
Other retailers, such as Home Depot and Wal-Mart, have cut back on the amount and kind of snow equipment that they sell in stores situated in increasingly milder parts of country.
The selections at Wal-Mart stores in the Roanoke Valley are vastly different from what are found at Wal-Marts in parts of Pennsylvania, said Mike Young, who manages the Shenandoah Valley region for Wal-Mart, which includes the Roanoke area.
Young lived in Pennsylvania for seven years, where stores stocked items from snow blowers to sleds and ski pants.
Young did not know why Wal-Mart's Valley View store was out of sleds on Thursday.
"We don't stockpile sleds like we used to 10 to 15 years ago," he said. "I think we pretty much every year we bring in what to sell in two or three good snows."
A lighter year for snow last year affected this winter's pre-season sales of salt at Northwest Hardware stores.
No one bought salt in advance this year, likely because they did not know what kind of weather this winter would bring, Overstreet said.
On Thursday, "a couple years of collections" of sleds that had not yet sold were available at Freestyle, a snowboarding, skateboarding and ski store in Roanoke County, said store manager Jesse Machac.
The store was trying to move 20 to 30 sleds, from $15 saucers to $100 fully-padded models.
"We haven't gotten a new shipment of sleds in probably two years," Machac said. "Nobody buys these things until it snows, and then, everybody wants them."
Still by midday Thursday, Freestyle had sold only four sleds.
"There will be no sled ordering this year," Machac said firmly.
Meanwhile, sledding inventory that is not sold this winter at Target will first be put on clearance and then donated to the local Salvation Army, said Tomm Musselman, a store manager and team leader at the Target near Valley View Mall.
Asked whether he thought The Salvation Army was in line for a windfall of sleds this year, Musselman replied: "That depends on the weather."
Industry figures on sled sales and inventory are hard to come by.
"No one seems to be terribly interested in keeping those numbers," said Tom Doyle, vice president of information and research for the National Sporting Goods Association in Mount Prospect, Ill.
"It's kind of one of those freak things. You get snow, you sell sleds. You don't get snow, you don't sell sleds," he said, adding that the figures are usually so small that tracking them would be too costly.
At least one kind of sled will sell well each year at Northwest Hardware, even when it's not snowing.
It's the classic wooden sled with the metal frame, known to many as the Flexible Flyer version, Overstreet said.
These winter toys are considered symbols of nostalgia, and before Christmas, people often buy them as gifts to be placed under a Christmas tree.
"My wife uses it as a decoration," Overstreet said.
Staff Writer Christina Rogers contributed to this report.
