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The Club PUBlication 12/30/2019

12/30/2019

What to buy (and skip) in January

Shop with purpose to save more money.
By Courtney Jespersen NerdWallet
DECEMBER 27, 2019 — 8:41PM

This could be the year that you shop with purpose and save more money.

Here are our recommendations for what to buy — and skip — in January 2020.

Buy: Christmas decorations.
The period after Christmas has long been the best time to buy Christmas decorations.

You may scoop up some post-Christmas deals on Dec. 26, but come Jan. 1, there will still be a handful of artificial trees, red ornaments and shiny wrapping paper spilling into store clearance aisles. Stock up on holiday closeouts if you have space to store extra tinsel until next December.

Skip: Toys.
Toys were hot during the holidays, but with Christmas over, January likely won’t see many worthwhile toy deals. The good news is, your little ones are probably set for awhile with all of their December gifts.

Buy: TVs.
The end of football season marks the beginning of television deals, as retailers help shoppers prep for viewing parties. The Super Bowl is slated for Feb. 2, and we expect retailers will kick off sales at the end of January, making it an excellent time to score a bargain.

Traditionally, major retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, Target and others discount a wide variety of TVs in assorted brands and sizes before the big game. Look for similar savings again in 2020.

Skip: Mattresses.
Great deals on mattresses happen in February when Presidents’ Day sales bring discounts. For instance, in 2019, Mattress Firm offered a free adjustable base with a qualifying mattress purchase of $599 or more. Nectar Sleep gave $125 off, plus two free pillows, with purchase of a Nectar mattress.

This year, Presidents’ Day is Feb. 17, so wait another month if you’re in the market for a new mattress.

If February is too soon for your budget, mattress deals will return in May, over Memorial Day weekend, and in September, over Labor Day weekend.

Buy: Fitness gear.
January is a solid time to sign up for a gym at a discount, as many chains offer special New Year’s rates. But don’t spend that money unless you are sure you will use the membership. All too often, new members lock themselves in for a full year, then stop showing up after a month or two.

Or, if you prefer to work out at home, fitness equipment will be discounted, too.
Shop: White sales. You might not want to buy a whole new mattress, but you can save on the sheets and blankets that go on your existing one. January is when department stores host “white sales” to clear out their inventory of sheets, towels, blankets and more. Expect savings to be especially deep on clearance items. In the past, we’ve seen stores offer 60 to 70% off bedding basics.

Bonus: Martin Luther King Jr. Day sales.
You may not associate King’s birthday holiday with shopping, but retailers certainly do. It falls on Jan. 20, and you can anticipate deals on clothing and home goods. Highlights from prior holiday weekend sales included up to 75% off linens at Bloomingdale’s and a coupon for 40% off a purchase at Gap.

Bonus: National Spaghetti Day.
The calendar is filled with days of observation for just about everything, and one of them — National Spaghetti Day — happens
Jan. 4, your chance to get dinner on the house at participating restaurants.

Courtney Jespersen is a writer at NerdWallet. E-mail: courtney@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @CourtneyNerd.

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The Club PUBlication 12/23/2019

12/23/2019

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TINY WONDERLAND
A Twin Cities man creates his own Christmas village with houses inspired by his favorite movies.
By KIM PALMER

Jeff Junkins has created a village of handcrafted miniature buildings that he displays on the lower level of his Golden Valley home.

If you own a Department 56 Christmas village you might have pieces of Jeff Junkins’ work on your mantel or tabletop. Junkins designed nearly 200 miniature buildings for the Eden Prairie-based producer of ceramic holiday collectibles. “I have all my pieces,” he said of his work for Department 56, which includes buildings from the Original Snow Village and the “Christmas Story” movie village. But that’s not all Junkins has. In his Golden Valley basement, he’s created a one-of-a-kind winter wonderland village featuring intricately detailed replicas of iconic houses from some of his favorite movies There’s the Bates Motel from “Psycho” with Norman Bates staring ominously from an upper window. Nearby is “Annie’s house” from “The Birds,” complete with a tiny Tippi Hedren look-alike. Perched on a “hill” is the dramatic modernist Vandamm House from “North by Northwest.” There’s even a steam-spouting train that chugs its way through the cinematic landscape. Junkins started working on his village a few years ago. “It was my therapy after my dad died,” he said. “I was blue.” His miniature houses are made of balsa wood and foam core, with handcrafted architectural details, such as gingerbread trim and hand-painted stone. Each structure takes him about 40 to 80 hours to complete, working in the evenings after his day job as a graphic designer.

“It’s hard for me to sit and just watch TV,” he said. “I have to be doing something.”

A replica of the modernist house featured in “North by Northwest.”

“Annie’s house” from “The Birds,” complete with tiny birds on the roof.

A Tippi Hedren look-alike figure with her Aston Martin parked in front.

The country house featured in “Holiday Inn.” 5. Cary Grant starred in “Mr. Blanding Builds His Dream House” featuring this old farmhouse.

Cary Grant starred in "Mr Blanding Builds His Dream House" featuring this old farmhouse.

Natalie Wood’s character, Susan, wished for this house in “Miracle on 34th Street.

A miniature replica of the Portland Malt Shoppe, a real malt shop in Duluth

The ramnshackle Bates Motel from "Psycho"

The house featured in “Hocus

Detail showing Norman Bates at the window.

The elaborate Victorian house from "meet Me in St. Louis.

Jeff Junkins, right and his husband, Mike Dillon, deorate four Christmas to set the stage for the big holiday party they host most years in December. "Im crazy about Christmas._ said Junkins. "It's my favorite time of thew year."

The village, which stays up year-round, is a popular part of the decor at the holiday party that Junkins and his husband, Mike Dillon , host most years.
“The party is the high point of the season for me,” said Junkins. “The bar is set up here, next to the village,” and he enjoys sharing his creations with party guests.
Junkins pours his creativity into his village. The houses nestle into a “landscape” base made of Styrofoam cut with a hot knife, painted to resemble terrain, then sprinkled with “snow.” Snow-dusted twigs and weeds become trees. It’s winter in the village because “winter is easier,” he said. “I’m an amateur at landscaping and snow is easier than grass.”

And besides, winter is the season of Christmas.

“I’m crazy about Christmas,” he said. “It’s my favorite time of the year.”

In addition to the village, Junk-ins and Dillon also decorate four Christmas trees. Most are traditional, with a mixture of blown-glass collectibles and family heirloom ornaments.

“The downstairs tree is more contemporary, midcentury,” he said, befitting their midcentury rambler. “That’s Mike’s tree.”

It started with a train
Junkins’ love of Christmas and fascination with creating tiny toy-sized structures began in childhood in Cedar Falls, Iowa. “My mother is a big Christmas nut. She let me decorate the tree when I was little,” he said.

When he was 7, his parents gave him a model train. “My train was a big part of my growing up,” he said. “I would tinker with little houses, and I started to make my own buildings as a way to save my allowance.”

Years later, as an adult, he was tinkering with little houses again, as a side business creating replicas of people’s homes. Minnesota Monthly magazine featured his work, which prompted a call from Department 56 and the opportunity to work as a contractor, dreaming up new buildings to be turned into ceramic village collectibles.

“I would design a house and make a little foam core study,” he said. It’s basically the same process he uses to create his own little houses for his basement village. “But these are clad in wood and more detailed,” he said.

His first houses were made from kits, but soon he was designing and building his own from scratch.

“I watch the movies over and over,” he said, studying the architectural details. “Sometimes you can find still shots online,” he noted. And sometimes, especially when the whole house isn’t visible in the movie, he improvises. “It’s fun to make it up,” he said.

He took some creative license when crafting one of his favorite houses, inspired by the tower-topped dwelling in the movie “Hocus Pocus.”

“You only see a little snippet of it in the movie,” he said. “It had an awful ’70s addition. I made it a little prettier.”

The grand Victorian mansion from “Meet Me in St. Louis” was the hardest one to replicate.

“There’s so much detail,” he said. He relied on a friend’s laser cutter to produce the tiny detailed rickrack trim. “I could never get that small with an X-Acto knife.”
Junkins has lots of plans for future pieces, including adding Mount Rushmore to the landscape near the “North by Northwest” house.

And there’s a Twin Cities landmark he’s eager to tackle.

“Next I want to do the Mary Tyler Moore house,” he said. “It’s such an iconic Minneapolis house. It will be a big challenge because of the turrets. I am so inspired to do more!”

Kim Palmer • 612-673-4784

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The Club PUBlication 12/16/2019

12/16/2019

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BUSINESS
Minnesota farmers not the only producers angry over Trump's costly China trade war
St. Paul speaker manufacturer Dan Digre, who hasn't voted for a Democrat for president for 40 years, says he has had it with President Trump's trade war.
DECEMBER 14, 2019 — 4:47PM

Owner Dan Digre of St. Paul’s MISCO, an industrial speaker manufacturer, has canceled growth plans as the tariff war has cut profits nearly in half. Digre’s late father, Cliff started the Minneapolis Speaker Co. (MISCO) in 1949 to fix radios.

Neal St. Anthony

On Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported President Donald Trump has agreed to a half-a-loaf trade agreement with Beijing that will ease tariff rates on some Chinese goods and cancel new taxes set to take effect Sunday, in order to boost Chinese purchases of U.S. farm goods.

Regardless, St. Paul speaker manufacturer Dan Digre, who hasn’t voted for a Democrat for president for 40 years, has had it with Trump’s trade war.

Digre’s 100-employee firm, Misco, started as a radio-repair firm by Digre’s father after World War II, is one of the last of the U.S. manufacturers that make industrial speakers used by airlines, automotive and other equipment manufacturers.

Misco, founded as Minneapolis Speaker Co., imports only some components from China that are no longer made in America.

Misco designs, fabricates some parts and assembles in a St. Paul facility it moved to earlier this year for expansion. Instead of a new product line, Digre is using that money to pay tariffs on Chinese parts. And he traveled to Asia last week to find an alternative supplier to China.

Moreover, he’s had it with Trump telling the public that the U.S. tariffs ranging to 25% are paid by the Chinese.

“It’s hundreds of thousands of dollars I’m paying,” said Digre, who said 40% of Misco profits are taken by tariffs. “I pay 25% on parts I need to build speakers in America. My competitors who build speakers in China and import into the U.S. pay 15%. That’s not right.

“I could say, ‘OK, I’ll build in China. Then I’ll pay lower taxes.’ That is messed up. Manufacturing in the U.S.A. is a core part of who we are and what we do. And laying off people is the last thing I would do.”

Digre was spending a pretty penny last week to travel to the Philippines to explore alternative component manufacturers.

“I could move some parts to Philippines from China,” Digre said. “But I’ve custom-tooled thousands of parts. I would have to retool everything. That could be millions in tooling expenses. And that could take two to three years. But if I don’t think tariffs are going away, I better start spending to retool and find new vendors. Meanwhile, I’m not reinvesting in what will keep me competitive in the future.”

U.S. corn and soybean farmers have received nearly $30 billion in subsidies to offset their tariff-related losses with China. Most of the money has gone to huge operators; at the same time U.S. commodity prices are depressed, forcing tough times on a lot of family farmers.

“The longer this goes on the worse it gets,” Digre said. “It’s a very challenging problem. Discouraging. Our government is doing this to us. They’re doing it to our farmers. There’s something wrong with a strategy that throws small business and small farmers under the bus.”

Digre has met with U.S. Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith, who are sympathetic but also unable to move the Trump administration.

We do now know that trade wars are not “easy to win,” as Trump once asserted. The Trump administration has ranged from hinting at imminent big deals with China to suggesting that Trump is content to wait out China until after the 2020 elections.

Minnesota businesses have paid an extra $704 million on products subject to Trump tariffs, including $72 million in September, according to data collected by the Trade Partnership and distributed by Tariffs Hurt the Heartland, a group of businesses and farmers, including Digre.

“The consequence that we’re most concerned about in agriculture is that once you lose [the] market, it’s hard to get it back,” Kevin Paap, president of the conservative-leaning Minnesota Farm Bureau, said last month.

Matt Moore, general counsel at Bloomington-based Quality Bicycle Products, which employs 800 and sells 48,000 parts, accessories and bicycles, told the Star Tribune last month that China-related tariffs equal about 40% of profits.

Moore traveled to Washington, D.C., to argue that bike helmets and safety lights should be excluded from the tariffs because they are safety items. The products inexplicably were dropped from one round of tariffs, but then added to another.

Moore spent one week asking the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative for an exclusion on six specific imports. None of his applications were approved.

“It’s been a drain on resources with no certain result, but the only way you can possibly get one is to try, so that’s what we do,” Moore said.

The Trade Partnership has called on the U.S. to end Trump’s trade war.

Some commentators, noting that China always takes the long view and historically doesn’t knuckle under to foreign pressure, are at a loss to say how this ends well. Unless Team Trump can pull off a real deal and explain its benefits clearly this month.

Before the apparent agreement, tariffs of about 15% on $160 billion in Chinese exports to the U.S. were set to take effect on Sunday.

Neal St. Anthony has been a Star Tribune business columnist/reporter since 1984.

Neal.St.Anthony@startribune.com 612-673-7144 @StAnthonyStrib

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The Club PUBlication 12/09/2019

12/9/2019

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VARIETYLileks:
Is it possible to hate your printer more? Yes
DECEMBER 2, 2019 — 9:44AM

JAMES LILEKS

It's wise to live a virtuous life for its own rewards, but if you worry that your sins may land you in a hot place, look on the bright side. You might ask your neighbor in the lake of fire what he did back in the living world.

“I designed home printers,” he groans.
“Really. What sent you to Hades?”
“I designed home printers.”
“Anyone else in your business down here?”
“All of us.”

I believe I speak for the entirety of humanity when I say we all loathe our printers. Oh, right, I see a hand up in the back. Yes, let me guess. You have a Canson XE845 Laser Printer you got in 2004, and it’s never jammed or given you a bad copy, and it cost $5,393, and you actually know what “toner” is. Thank you. The rest of us have a different story.

I bring up the matter because soon you might be needing holiday card labels or letters, and you will need to print them. That’s your first problem, right there: needing to print. Printers are perfectly fine if you never want to print anything, but if you ask your Bartleby EZPrint HomeOfficeMate 43920 to do the thing for which it was specifically designed, it will inform you that it prefers not to.

Yes, this is an old, tired gripe. We have lamented for years that the printer will not print the word “magenta” in black and white because it is out of magenta. We all know that when we go to print, we suddenly fear we are magenta-deficient. After all, we can’t go to the cupboard for some extra magenta.

But there’s a new type of printer you might be tempted to buy, and this requires a tale about something I thought impossible: It made me hate my printer more.

A few years ago, my old printer expired from clogged nozzles, permanently unaligned heads, corrupted color profiles and all the other maladies that afflict these junky chunks of money-sucking plastic. The new one had a twist — you’d sign up for a small monthly fee, and ink would automatically arrive at your door before it went dry. Doesn’t that sound fantastic?

Since Daughter went off to college and there was no more need to print off assignments, I haven’t printed much. So the other day I got to thinking: Why pay $5.99 a month so I can print a boarding pass from my phone when I can cancel it and spend that $5.99 on a new streaming service I’ll never watch?

But what of the holiday labels? I saw an ad for a new printer that had tanks of ink, refillable from bottles. For once you could actually have extra magenta on hand, so you could yell at the printer in triumph. “Hah! You thought you had me, didn’t you? Well, I’ve got magenta coming out of my ears, pal. Open wide.”
Count me in. Off to the store I went.

“How often do you print?” the clerk asked.

I replied, “Hardly ever. Maybe a family photo. Given the price of ink, I’d be better off hiring an artist to draw the pictures.”

He nodded. “This isn’t for you. The ink will dry up.”

Well, dang. An honest man. Went home, looked at the printer. “Guess we’re stuck together until you fail at some crucial juncture. But at least I’ve got a full supply of ink for holiday labels ...”

Hello, there’s a blinking light. It can’t connect to the internet or Wi-Fi. I tried printing; nothing. Tried reinstalling the software; nothing.

Then my printer sent me an e-mail, which is a bit like getting a registered letter from your vacuum cleaner or a phone call from your stove. Since I had unenrolled from the ink program, the cartridges — for which I’d already paid — would not work after tomorrow.

In a way, it was oddly impressive that someone had come up with a way to make printers even more evil. It also seemed obvious that the manufacturer had bricked my printer and made it unable to connect to my computer, but would they really go that far? Excommunicate the customer and cast him into the slough of despair just because he had enough ink for a while and canceled the automatic delivery?

There was only one way to be sure. I re-enrolled in the ink program. About a minute later the printer found the internet, connected to my computer and happily spat out a picture I’d sent as a test.

Wretched as this is, I had agreed to it. I had clicked ACCEPT when I signed up for the ink, and 4,320 lines down in the agreement was a paragraph saying something along the lines of:

“You grant the manufacturer (hereafter, Satan) the right to disable your purchase at any time if Satan decides that you no longer seem sufficiently devotional to the Product, or have attempted to sever your pact with Satan to consume the ink, or no longer believe that Satan is your best option for home office solutions.”

Satan must have kicked himself when he came up with that one. Why didn’t I think of that sooner? These idiots will agree to anything if the contract’s too long.
This is the conversation we will have in the lake of fire: “What are you in for?”
“Agreed to the End User License Agreement for my printer. And you?”
“Oh, I wrote it.”

James Lileks is a Star Tribune columnist.

jlileks@startribune.com 612-673-7858 @lileks

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The Club PUBlication 12/02/10190

12/2/2019

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BUSINESS 565523672
Ready, set, shop: Is a record-setting $1 trillion retail holiday season in the offing?
Key trends to watch as stores raise the curtain on the busy shopping season
By Jackie Crosby Star Tribune

NOVEMBER 27, 2019 — 7:31PM

Isnino Jimale and Ayni Shardi of Faribault and Roda Farah and Nora Shardi of Burnsville shopped at Mall of America on Black Friday 2018.

The unofficial start of the holiday shopping season is upon us.

No longer a one-day dash for doorbusters, retail watchers now count the five days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday as the holiday season's curtain raiser.

If Christmas creep and increased traffic in your neighborhood touches off your inner grouch, consider that retail is America's largest private-sector employer, supporting one in four U.S. jobs and adding $2.6 trillion to the annual GDP.

The upcoming holiday season presents a mixed bag for retailers, analysts said. Consumers feel pretty good about their household finances. Wages have inched up and the unemployment rate is hovering near a 50-year low.

As Target Corp. Chief Executive Brian Cornell told reporters last week: "There is no indicator as we sit here today that the consumer environment is slowing as we enter the holiday season."

But an undercurrent of uncertainty exists, with hints of a recession and the lingering overhang of tariffs and a trade war. A late Thanksgiving could put pressure on retail growth, and promotions may cut into profits.

A shopper caught an early Black Friday deal Tuesday on a TV at a Best Buy in Henderson, Nev., before the shopping season began in earnest.

As the critical holiday season gets underway, here are some defining trends and expectations for the coming months.
The outlook

The 2019 holiday could mark retailers' first ever trillion-dollar shopping season, according to a number of market-research firms, including Deloitte and eMarketer.

Deloitte forecasts a bump in sales as high as 5% compared with last year. The nation's largest retail-industry group, the National Retail Federation (NRF), expects consumers to spend an average $1,048 during the holiday-shopping season. NRF's crystal-ball readers predict a 4.2% increase at the high end.

Twin Cities shoppers, who typically fall below the national average, are expected to spend $649, according to Accenture.

Consumer-buying patterns can flicker. Last year's holiday sales came in below forecasts, growing by 2.1% to $686 billion, as a government shutdown, rising trade tensions and a late-December stock market plunge merged into a trifecta that spooked consumers.

Yet even with double-digit growth in e-commerce and shifting attitudes to seek out experiences over stuff, most researchers said the extended Black Friday weekend has not lost its luster.

"There's always going to be an appetite for consumers to think about their shopping plans, whether they're doing it in their pajamas or doing that at 4 a.m. in front of a brick-and-mortar retailer," said Michael Sansone, a Minneapolis-based leader in the consumer and retail practice of global consultant A.T. Kearney. "Regardless, they're going to be in a shopping spirit."

The calendar crunch
A turn of the calendar leaves six fewer shopping days between Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. The compressed time frame could weigh on retailers' profit potential as it robs them of that extra weekend of potential sales. But consumers could see more deals as retailers compete for dollars.

More than half of retailers surveyed by RetailMeNot and Kelton said they plan to offer deeper discounts than usual. Most began running deals earlier this year.
Walmart started its holiday sales Oct. 25. Kohl's conducted a "holiday kickoff" on Nov. 1.

It might be working. Between Nov. 15 and 21, Nordstrom Inc. saw web revenue almost double while Walmart's grew 67% in a recent survey of U.S. retailers by Edison Trends.

"It's likely to be very competitive out there in terms of pricing," said Retail Metrics analyst Ken Perkins. "There should be some good deals for consumers."

Bricks and clicks
Brick-and-mortar stores remain the dominant sales channel, accounting for nearly 87% of total holiday spending. But e-commerce will be nearly as significant. Two-thirds of holiday shoppers are likely to buy gifts both online and in stores this year, according to Deborah Weinswig, CEO of Coresight Research.

Balo Balogun labeled toys for a holiday sale at a Walmart Supercenter in Las Vegas. Thanksgiving falls on the latest possible date it can, condensing the shopping season.

"Consumers desire frictionless shopping experiences," she said in a recent report.

Holiday e-commerce sales will rise more than 13% this year, more than three times faster than the total retail growth rate, eMarketer predicts.
'Free' shipping

The real battlefront is delivery.

Free shipping trumps fast shipping by more than 5-1, Deloitte researchers found. In fact, shoppers are willing to wait up to seven days to get an item if they don't feel they are paying the cost of freight.

But most consumers want it all: free and speedy. And the divide between retailers that have invested in logistics and those that haven't will widen.

"This is the time when Amazon starts to take share from everybody," Retail Metrics' Perkins said.

Richfield-based Best Buy kicked off the holidays with an Oct. 22 announcement that it, too, would offer free next-day delivery, putting it in the shipping game with Target, Walmart and Amazon. Target Corp. is sinking an additional $50 million in payroll this year, doubling its staff dedicated to filling digital orders, including same-day services.

Amazon continues to sacrifice short-term profits in a bid for long-term customer loyalty. In the third quarter, shipping costs rose 46%, or $3 billion compared with last year.

"Amazon can absorb this margin erosion far better than most of its rivals," said Neil Saunders, an analyst with GlobalData Retail. "This is because of the profitability of its other service divisions and because of the tolerance of investors. So, in a sense, Amazon is still winning the long-term war of attrition."

No last-minute rush?
Once upon a time, malls could count on a flurry of last-minute shoppers. But the convenience of online shopping has led to a plunge in procrastination.

The growing popularity of Amazon's Prime Day event in summer is part of shifting shopping patterns. A third of consumers surveyed by market research firm NPD Group said they did some holiday shopping during the two-day Prime event in July.

In 2011, last-minute Larrys and Lolas accounted for more than a third of shoppers. This year, fewer than 20% planned to start late.

It's the "new normal" of the holiday shopping season, the NPD report asserted.

Jackie Crosby is a general assignment business reporter who also writes about workplace issues and aging. She has also covered health care, city government and sports.

jcrosby@startribune.com 612-673-7335 jackiecrosby

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