IT’S MY MONEY | The end of October equals the end of Breast Cancer Awareness month and good-bye pink!

Anyone who knows me knows I have an disproportionately large amount of pink stuff (clothes, home decor, Hello Kitty paraphernalia), but I’m so tired of seeing pink merchandise in stores and magazines!

Don’t get me wrong, I dislike breast cancer as much as anyone else and I definitely think people should be aware of it, but I think the pink crap campaign has gone too far. A pink box of Wheat Thins? Give me a break! Check out the site Think Before You Pink for more on this.

Raising awareness about diseases is an important endeavor, but it doesn’t have to be carried out via over-priced pink merchandise attached with promises of “supporting breast cancer research.” It’s in the marketing, according to an interesting Yahoo! Finance article. Retailers and manufacturers are probably benefiting more than the cause: some products only give small fractions of the profits or literally a few cents to the charity regardless of the purchase price. Wow, don’t knock yourself out with all that generosity!

Instead of buying a pink M & Ms, how about giving money to people who don’t have health insurance? That could probably save more lives than buying into the Pink Campaign.

AT THE SCENE | Would you wait an hour in the check out line for groceries? Most people would say no, but the shoppers who flocked to today’s grand opening of the new WinCo Foods in Pittsburg. I saw hundreds of people in lines that snaked all the way to the back of the expansive store.

They talked on cellphones, clipped coupons or just stared blankly at the person ahead of them. I commend those shoppers for their patience, but an hour or more to check out?!! That’s like Disneyland!

The things I hear most about WinCo are that it has rock-bottom prices and a wide selection of bulk foods ranging from chocolate chips to dry pasta. Today, the store offered some specials like $5 pinatas, 18 cents for a pound of bananas and Betty Crocker cake mixes for 68 cents. But as one shopper told me, the savings add up with each product. I saw a number of people with two carts full. Amazing!

Here are maps with both Bay Area locations in Pittsburg and Brentwood.

Be sure to check out tomorrow’s paper for the full story!

AT THE SCENE | I visited the new aerie shop in Sunvalley and was surprised at how much I liked it. (check my previous post for more info on aerie). The store is neat and organized with white shelving and dark hardwood floors (nice touch for a store that caters to teens and college students!).

aerie has given pajamas and intimates the young, cool treatment: bright colors, cute prints and comfortable designs. The bra and undie section offers lots of variety minus the awkward, oversexedness of other intimates shops.

Second, the prices are not rock bottom, but not over the top, either. Sturdy hoodies were marked at $40. Thick fleece pants are $35. Babydoll T’s with shiny stripes ring up at $25. Panties are 4 for $20.

But, of course, as any smart shopper should do, I made my way to the clearance section. There I found a pair of deep purple and white polka-dot pajama pants. They were priced on sale for $19.99, but rang up at $11.95! What a deal!

If that wasn’t enough the light my shopping fire, the cashier asked me to pick out a ribbon to tie my shopping bag. Completely unnecessary, but kind of nice. Later on I opened the bag and found a stuffed, scented bird inside. It’s perfect for adding some freshness to a clothing or sock drawer. It’s nice details like that make retailers memorable and keep shoppers wanting to come back. Bravo, aerie!

aerie makes unmentionables the new casual.

RETAIL DETAIL | Sunvalley Mall in Concord has a tenant: aerie by American Eagle. Retailers have already made casual the new semi-formal, and now pajamas are the new casual. The store is a new concept AE is testing out that focuses on sleepwear, intimates, exercise gear and something they call “dorm-wear” for the 15 to 25 year-old crowd.

But another thing, it’s for ladies only. It’s like Victoria’s Secret for high schoolers and I’m glad there’s an new a option for the phase in between Barbie printed-panties and iridescent push-up bras.

Check here later today for my take on a visit to the aerie. I’m technically outside the store’s demographic, but I was the queen of comfort-over-style in college!

RETAIL DETAIL | There’s a week left and I still don’t have a costume! It’s like lots of other approaching deadline, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve been thinking about it — you still end up waiting until the last minute.

Halloween shopping has become serious business. The National Retail Federation predicts shoppers will spend more than $5 billion on the holiday this year with the average consumer spending $65.

The biggest shopping day for Halloween is the day before. If you wait until then, you’ll get a nice dose of poor selection and long lines.

There are still a few days to beat the rush. Retailers like Spirit Halloween Stores, Halloween Headquarters and Amazon offer tons of costumes and expediated shipping. It might help to hit up some local Halloween stores and try on a few things to get in the spirit of dressing up.

RETAIL DETAIL | Store closures may be bad for business, but good for us shoppers. Bombay Co., a vendor of home decor and furniture, announced last week it plans to close all of its stores in the United States.

The stores will close, as one employee told me, “when all the merchandise is sold.” Furniture has been marked down 20 percent, home accessories are 30 percent off and textiles and linens are 40 percent off.

Bombay Co. has several stores in the East Bay including Walnut Creek, Concord, Pleasanton and Emeryville. Check out this map for locations.

Housewares stores like Bombay, Cost Plus World Market, Pottery Barn and Pier 1 Imports have been struggling for the last several years because people are buying fewer things for their homes and have started shopping mass market retailers like Target and Wal-Mart for those goods. Bombay is the first I’ve heard of to call it quits. Get out there and shop while you can!

WEEKLY FREEBIE | Starbucks Coffee has started giving away free iTunes download
when you buy something. For my double tall vanilla latte, I scored John Legend’s song “Show me.” Starbucks picks a different song everyday, so you don’t get a choice, but it’s a way to try out new music and artists.

Speaking of free music, British rock band Radiohead has released its latest record In Rainbows with a “pay what you want” pricetag. I decided to enter “$0.00″ and it worked! I paid what I wanted: nothing. That doesn’t mean I think the record is worthless, I did it as an experiment to see if Radiohead was serious about giving consumers a choice.

Pricing strategist Rafi Mohammed of Pricing for Profit, sent me the following stats on the Radiohead topic:

• Low risk: Radiohead makes at most a 25% royalty from a download that retails for $10. By eliminating middlemen, Radiohead can reap high profits even accounting for the occasional customer that stiffs the band.

• Increases fan base: The fact that customers can pay what they want means more customers will be exposed to their music.

• Opportunities to further profit: Radiohead will sell CDs in retail stores as well as an $81 premium boxed set. Establishes relationship with fans through its web site. Additionally, the real profit comes from concert tour.

• Start of a trend: Well-known musicians, writers, and television shows may shun traditional media companies in favor of self publishing/distributing.

An overview shot of Draeger’s in San Mateo.

AT THE SCENE | I can’t even count how many times in the last year someone has said to me: “You’ve never been to Draeger’s? You have to go to Draeger’s!” And to my surprise, I do agree, Draeger’s is a different kind of grocery store.

The retailer will open it’s fourth location and first East Bay store tomorrow in Blackhawk Plaza, so I decided to visit the one in San Mateo. You can check out my full story in tomorrow’s paper.

Yes, it’s expensive, as good food is these days, but Draeger’s gives grocery shopping a luxury treatment I wasn’t expecting. Shiny floors, elegant signs and logos, bright lights, imported stuff everywhere — it’s like shopping at Nordstrom!

I have to admit, if I wasn’t the poor journalist that I am, I would love to shop at Draeger’s. Unlike Whole Foods, where everything feels earthy and natural, Draeger’s feels like a string of pearls or a seat in first class. Even if you can’t spend a lot there, it’s nice to at least walk around.

RETAIL DETAIL | I got a sneak peek at the new Home Depot Design Center that opens tomorrow in Concord. Check out my story in today’s paper for more details.

Home Depot is testing out a new store format aimed at women and couples who would rather browse through shiny displays than towering racks of pipes and bags of cement.

Workers were still setting up the new Design Center when I visited, but I could already see this store will much more appealing and easier to navigate for the uninitiated than your average Home Depot. By uninitiated, I mean people who are not builders, contractors or handymen. Home Depot’s other warehouse format does serve a niche and has succeeded; the chain operates more than 2,200 stores.

The Home Depot for women, as this store was dubbed in my newsroom, is nice. Check out the photos of the fancy chandeliers, decorative bathtubs and colorful organization bins. It kind of feels like Restoration Hardware, Target and the Container Store all rolled into one!

Since Home Depot is pushing itself into new frontiers, it could have played more with its logo and naming of the store. Even just “Design Center” minus the Home Depot would have a little more cachet and make it more obvious that this isn’t a store where you go if you need to re-do all the plumbing in your home.

TIP JAR | Target, the place that made big-box retail fun, has found a way to help you get what you want with a tool called Target Lists. The feature let’s you create gift wish-lists for any event (birthdays, Christmas, graduation, next Monday). What this means is that you don’t have to get married or have a baby to ask for whatever you want!

I bought a wedding gift recently and realized how awesome it is to request specific gifts. Some people may think it is greedy or materialistic, but I think it takes a lot of guesswork out of the gift-giving process.

Whenever I buy a gift, I worry that I’m wasting money on something the recipient doesn’t want, will never use, or worse, re-gift to someone else! On the flip side, I’ve received things that are just not that useful for me. The primary culprit is scented soaps or lotions that I can’t use because I have dry, sensitive skin.

The one drawback is that if you make a list at Target’s Web site, then you limit yourself to that store, which can be good or bad depending on how much you like it. Otherwise, I think it’s a great and handy concept.