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Stephen Peever holds up a ugly Christmas sweater on Granville Street in downtown Vancouver, B.C., Friday, Dec. 5, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jonathan Hayward |
Justin SmallbridgeThe Canadian Press
For years, sweaters bristling with bells, lights, appliqued Santa Clauses, snowmen and reindeer were mocked as the exclusive province of the tasteless at Christmas.
But the tide is turning and the ugly Christmas sweater has become the season’s newest tradition and continues to grow.
“Right after Halloween we bring in the ugly Christmas sweaters,” said Tracy Lynn the manager of Used House of Vintage, where street-level signs — one brandished by a man in a Mr. Peanut costume — tell Vancouver shoppers they can find “5,000 ugly Christmas sweaters upstairs.”
“It goes up every year. It’s definitely up this year,” Lynn said of the amount of merchandise her store was selling.
“We’re selling more, sooner, earlier in the season than we were last year.”
Both Lynn and Stephen Peever, who mans a sidewalk stall, Ugly Christmas Sweaters, say demand had increased markedly in the past three or four years. They attributed that growth to more people having office and house parties featuring ugly Christmas sweaters.