(Rasmussen Poll) 67% Prefer Merry Christmas While 26% Opt For Happy Holidays

My first "real" job was working Saturdays and holidays in a small town department store.

We sold clothing and shoes, and during Christmas we did free gift wrapping.

The store's owner was a Jewish Gentleman who treated me as his own son. When I was injured in a football game in high school he was the first person to get to me on the field and he came from out of the stands.

He taught me everything I know about sales.

His greatest lesson was, "Make people feel happy and comfortable, and you can sell them anything. Make them feel angry and insult them and you can't sell them toilet paper in a diarrhea ward."

He always had Christmas music playing non-stop from the time the doors were opened until they closed and wished everyone he saw a Very Merry Christmas and insisted all sales people did the same.

We got some new decorations one year that said Happy Holidays and he got so mad he called the company where he bought the items and gave them absolute Hell.

He then sent me to a town 20 miles away to get replacement decorations with these instructions: "And make damn sure they say Merry Christmas. Not Happy Holidays. Not Merry Xmas. Merry Christmas."

Modern stores could learn a lot from his philosophy.

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