Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, November 21, 1994 TAG: 9411220070
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
From miners digging road salt under Lake Erie to homeowners buying record numbers of snow blowers, Americans are gearing up for what they fear could be another tough winter.
Sales of warm outerwear started early, said Catharine Hartnett of L.L. Bean, the Freeport, Maine, catalog dealer in outdoor gear.
``Our sense is that outerwear items, which are always popular at this time of year, are even more so,'' she said, adding that parkas and fleece pullovers have been especially strong sellers.
Snow blowers are also a hot item.
Peter Dobbins, vice president of Crandall-Hicks, a wholesale distributor in Westboro, Mass., said sales are up 400 percent over last year at this time.
Sears, Roebuck and Co., based in Chicago, also reports an early rush on snow blowers. Already this year, sales have topped the entire 1992 season.
``A lot of people are saying, `Hey I'm not going to shovel like that again this year,''' said Jet Jackson, co-owner of Jackson's Outdoor Sales in Schenectady, N.Y.
``Snow shovels and blowers are going very well - that's happening across the country. Customers are buying early and often,'' agreed Bob Butler of Hechinger's hardware stores, based in Landover, Md.
People remember last year's nightmare and they want to be prepared, said Butler. The chain of hardware stores ranging from New York to Virginia has sold 270 times the volume of snow-melting chemicals as at this time a year ago, and six times as many ice scrapers, Butler added.
By early November, a Hechinger's store in the Philadelphia area already had sold two tractor-trailer loads of ice-melt chemicals.
In Cleveland, miners are digging road salt from beneath Lake Erie, boosting production to help make up for the loss of a mine in New York that flooded last summer.
The National Weather Service's official winter forecast won't be out until the end of the month. But in the meantime, there are acorns and almanacs, woolly bear caterpillars and onion skins to be consulted.
The famous ``Old Farmer's Almanac,'' based in New Hampshire, expects an extremely variable winter, with record snow possible in the upper Great Plains, Great Lakes, New York and New England.
by CNB