STRICTLY BUSINESS: WHEN WILL YOU FINISH HOLIDAY SHOPPING?

One man remembers a Christmas Day of driving from quick shop to quick shop to a 7-11 store in search of a perfect gift for a certain person.

"I just needed that one final gift," said an employee of the Southeast Missourian newspaper who wants to remain anonymous. He found a gift.

On the other side of the Christmas coin, one person purchased the final Christmas gift on his list the first week of July. That same person indicated she was now on the lookout for Christmas 1998.

But the majority of the newspaper workers polled during a recent survey will complete their holiday shopping with about two weeks to spare.

When traditional gifts are purchased, there's a big difference between the sexes on when the buying is done.

Our unscientific survey revealed that only 15 percent of men completed their shopping two weeks before Christmas, compared to 45 percent of women.

Further, 22 percent of men were most likely to complete their holiday shopping the day before the holiday. And, men were also twice as likely as women to still be shopping on Christmas Day, or even later. The Missourian poll indicated that only 15 percent of women were still shopping on the final day.

One of those in that 15 percent bracket indicated she would still be looking the day after Christmas.

"I usually complete my shopping a week before Christmas," said the unidentified female. "But this year things have just been too hectic. I haven't even started yet."

'Almost' finished

Another office staff member "almost" completed her shopping early Friday -- the day after Thanksgiving -- when she and friends made their first stop at a Cape Girardeau store at 6 a.m.

Meanwhile, retail sales this year are expected to range from 3.5 to 4 percent more than 1996 sales.

America's Research Group, headed by Britt Beemer, a graduate of Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, estimated a 3.8 percent increase in sales.

Beemer, who was a guest speaker at the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce Business Conference during back-to-back years in the early 1990s, is founder of America's Research Group (in 1989), a full-service survey and consumer-research firm.

He was a guest speaker here during the retail market strategy sessions of the business conference in 1992 and 1993.

Beemer's group this year conducted a separate poll to determine the shopping plans of teen-agers, who are usually excluded in pools.

Teens, said Beemer, accounted for 16 percent of the Christmas holiday sales in 1996 and 12 percent in 1995.

Promoting 'Main Street'

A number of special programs have been designed during the past year to promote "Main Street" and/or downtown area development throughout the tri-state area -- Missouri, Illinois and Kentucky.

These are programs that work and cooperate with chambers of commerce, city and state officials, to improve environments and economics. Groups have been organized at Jackson and at Carbondale and Murphysboro in Illinois, and Paducah in Kentucky.

Murphysboro is the latest Southern Illinois community taking steps to "beef up" its Main Street.

Murphysboro, a city of 10,000 on Route 13 west of Carbondale, is forming Murphysboro Main Street Board, a group designed to promote downtown Murphysboro.

The purpose of the group, which will include a board of nine directors, is to build support for a revitalization effort, which includes improving the district's physical environment, rehabilitating historic and commercial buildings and strengthening the district's economic base by improving existing businesses, recruiting new ones and finding new uses for empty or under-used buildings.

The group is seeking members for the voluntary, communitywide organization

Murphysboro Chamber of Commerce members are automatically Main Street members. People can become a member said Christopher Basler, of the Murphysboro chamber.

An interim board -- made up of members who have attended Illinois Main Street workshops -- governs the program, with an election due in February. Two board members will be appointed by local units of government, the remaining seven will be elected at-large from the Main Street membership.

A busy group

The Small Business Recruitment Committee at Jackson, which is affiliated with the Jackson Chamber of Commerce and is made up of concerned Jackson merchants and business owners, has been a busy one during its first year.

The primary goal has been to bring retail business to Jackson, said Marvin Wormington, chairman of the committee.

This is happening. The group has compiled a trifold, color brochure outlining 20 reasons for establishing a business to Jackson and established a list of retail businesses merchants would like to see in Jackson.

Some previously empty buildings have been filled. New on the Jackson scene are a couple of new restaurants, an antique mall, a convenience store/service station among others.

And plans are on the board for a new Wal-Mart Supercenter.

The city, which has grown from the 1990 census of 9,256, to about 11,000, is in the middle of a population explosion.

Vacant building list

The Main Street Economic Restructuring Committee, formed recently at Carbondale, compiles building inventory information, which is continually updated as downtown business climate changes.

The program was designed to "track" empty structures along that Southern Illinois city's Main Street in the downtown area.

Of 182 buildings in the city's Main Street boundaries, only 15 are vacant.

The inventory survey will track such information as square footage, number of stories, heating and cooling systems, and potential of sub-dividing the space available, said Joel Fritzler, downtown manager.

This is information potential developers and renters want, said John Forbes, chairman of the Carbondale Main Street Committee.

'After-Dinner' program

The "After-Dinner" program has been successful in the Paducah downtown area.

A group of Paducah downtown businesses organized a team to revive business in the downtown area.

Under the "After Dinner" program, which started in April and continued through September, more than 50 businesses -- restaurants, clothing stores, antique and gift shops, art galleries, candy and coffee shops, jewelry stores, bakeries, pubs and others -- opened with extended hours Saturday nights.

Thousands of people flocked into the downtown area each Saturday night. A variety of music, including jazz, gospel, blues, classical, folk and country was performed at various sites throughout the downtown area.

The promotion was a good one, said Payne Sage of the Paducah Convention Visitors Bureau. "It brought people downtown."

Like Cape Girardeau, the downtown Paducah area is situated along the banks of a major river, the Ohio. And, like Cape Girardeau, the downtown area has been devastated by moves of some big retailers to a mall in the northwest section of town several years ago.

B. Ray Owen is business editor for the Southeast Missourian.