Aldridge's Always Christmas Store

The Aldridge's Always Christmas Store is a Christmas store that has been a destination spot for travelers and holiday shoppers year-round. It was opened in 1993 when the Aldridge family launched the store as part of Olde World Cantenbury Village at 90,000 square feet.^[1]

Coverage[]

The Aldridge's Always Christmas Store is featured in Holiday Hell.

Christmasstoreblackout — The store begins to blackout.

It was introduced in 1 day after people when it still Christmas in Aldridge's Always Christmas Store outside Detroit as the lights sparkle, the animated Santas and snowmen singing carols. The show gave information that Christmas spawned its own economy and Americans spent $154 billion in Christmas each year and imported nearly half a billion dollars worth of Christmas ornaments alone. The most iconic symbol of the season was the Christmas trees and another artifact being fruitcakes, a traditional holiday food. However, without power, the twinkling Christmas light dims, animatronics stop working, the carols stop, and the power goes out across the premises.

ChristmasStore20years — The interior of the Christmas store after 20 years.

Twenty years pass, and as yet another winter arrives, nature has been hard at work making festive scenes of its own with the coming of the seasons. As several windows have broken, snow blows in from the outside and mixes with artificial flocking. Soil, either blown in or naturally generated by plants has built up on the floor of the showroom, allowing greenery to thrive; grass grows on the floor, vines climb over shelves of plastic Santas and toy soldiers, and in a nearby aisle, fruitcake, thanks to the numerous preservatives and its unique method of production shows no sign of decay, being just as edible as the day it was put on display.

Eventually, eighty years after humanity vanished, nature has largely completed its takeover of the store. The roof caves in and the store itself is in an unstable condition. With winter arriving once more, a more natural display of the Christmas season takes hold as snow gently falls around the outside of the building, while a host of different plants continue to call the inside home. However, in spite of all the changes years of weathering have brought, one prominent reminder of the Christmases gone by still remains, as the store's four tallest artificial Christmas trees remain standing, having withstood the roof coming down around them.

Trivia[]

The building housing the Aldridge's Always Christmas Store was sold in 2014 to the Woodside Bible Church, and the business was moved to the smaller building right next to the old one.^[1]