If you poked your head out in East Texas yesterday and listened, really listened, you might have heard the sounds of paper ripping as the lucky recipients of gifts wrapped by Cindi and her elves from Festival of Flags and Gift Wrapping in Tyler opened their beautiful packages. Of course, most of us were too involved in our own Christmas celebrations to care. However, Cindi and her elves like to believe that much happiness resulted from their efforts to create gorgeously festive packages for her customers.
Gone are the order lists and the reservation lists from the tiny 230 square foot building space that houses the gift wrap and wrapped presents until their owners pick them up. Gone are the woeful laments of those who waited too late to get in on the last minute orders. Gone are the piles of trash created by paper and ribbon trimmings, and the piles of receipts stacked behind the register.
Christmas 2013 has come and gone.
Word to the wise: shop early for next Christmas and get your gifts to the shop early for the best wrapping paper selection, the fastest service, and the assurance that your gifts will be wrapped in time. I'm not talking December 15 early. I'm talking November 15 early. October 15 early. There's nothing we hate more than turning away customers, but with only three elves and 24 hours in a day, there are only so many gifts that can possibly be wrapped in one day. And we wrap all the gifts we receive on any given day THAT day. We don't save gifts to wrap for another day, and we don't store gifts for you to pick up later.
We understand that you have been ill. Yes, we sympathize that you have recently had surgery. We hate that you lost a loved one. We know the traffic is awful. We get that you have to pick up the kids. But we can only do what we can humanly do. Christmas comes on December 25 every year. Plan ahead.
Yes, we see you waiting outside for us to unlock the door. We don't open it until we have all the bows restocked, the displays ready, and paperwork in order. We estimate the number of gifts we can do on any given day and then we start a reserve list for the next day. We have our own families and holiday planning to do. It's not personal. We just like to get home at a decent hour and get some rest so we can do it again tomorrow.
Someone once said: "Lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on our part." So appropriate.
Now get out there. You've got 363 shopping days til Christmas. Then bring in your gifts. We will be very happy to make them beautiful for you!
XOXO
