LE MARS, Iowa -- Terry Claussen is blunt about Iowa's retail sales tax holiday: It just doesn't bring in the shoppers the way it used to.
"When it first came out it was pretty successful," said Claussen, who has operated Claussen's menswear shop in downtown Le Mars for 30 years. "But it just hasn't got the same excitement that it did back then."
There are customers, he said, who don't even know about the sales tax holiday. And when he tells them about it, they're often indifferent.
Terry Claussen, owner of Claussen's Menswear, is shown Friday at the store in Le Mars, Iowa. Claussen is blunt about Iowa's annual sales tax holiday on apparel. It just doesn't bring in the shoppers the way it used to.
Still, Claussen does what he can to lure in the shoppers on the holiday, held the first Friday and Saturday in August. Everything in the store is 15 percent off, in addition to the 7 percent savings on the state and local sales tax.
"Just lately, I just don't think it's quite got the same thrill to it, like it did," he said.
Iowa's 21st annual sales tax holiday ends at midnight Saturday. Sales taxes are not levied on certain clothing, shoes and apparel items priced less than $100.
Retailers and shoppers on Friday expressed mixed levels of enthusiasm (and awareness) of the tax holiday.
Sharon Lee traveled all the way from her home in Moorhead, Iowa, to browse in Sioux City stores during the tax holiday. She went to JCPenney and to the Bomgaars on Gordon Drive, but hadn't yet found anything.
For Lee, the sales tax holiday was a big deal years ago, and she still likes it.
"When my kids were smaller -- they're all grown and got kids of their own now -- I would make it a point (to shop during the tax holiday), because we'd buy all our underwear and our socks, and you know, those essential things that you need," she said.
Stacy Coenen, a sales associate at Bomgaars on Gordon Drive in Sioux City, removes a security tag from a pair of jeans at the checkout counter during Iowa's sales tax holiday Friday.
Several other shoppers in the clothing section at the Gordon Drive Bomgaars said they knew nothing about the sales tax holiday; one man said he'd seen something on television about it.
Heather Korbe, director of marketing at Bomgaars, said the sales tax holiday isn't usually an all-out bonanza for the chain, but it is nevertheless a good couple of days.
"We do see a little bit of an uptick in clothing sales," Korbe said.
Mike Pape, the owner of Rudolph's Shoe Mart on Southern Hills Drive, remembers well those first sales tax holidays of the early 2000s. In those days, the sales tax holiday was its own Black Friday, as shoppers clamored to save 7 percent.
"It's still good, not like those early days," said Pape, who was somewhat bewildered by the wild excitement of the first few sales tax holidays. "It's better than a normal day."
Greg Miller tries on a pair of dress shoes at Rudolph's Show Mart in Sioux City during Iowa's sales tax holiday Friday.
According to data from the Iowa Department of Revenue, the sales tax holiday still brings in the shoppers -- during the sales tax holiday of 2018, the state didn't collect around $4.4 million in sales taxes. The following year, the state estimates the sales tax holiday saved Iowa shoppers $4.6 million in sales taxes.
Greg Miller of Sioux City was trying on shoes at Rudolph's on Friday afternoon. He's a stalwart fan of the yearly sales tax break.
"Pretty much every year they've had it, I look and see what they have," Miller said.
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August 08, 2020 at 08:30AM
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Local retailers' enthusiasm for Iowa's sales tax holiday varies - Sioux City Journal
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