Some Retailers Not Expecting Boost In Sales This Tax Holiday

Tennessee retailers are looking forward to the sales tax holiday this weekend.

From Friday August 3rd until Sunday August 5th, school and some art supplies, as well as clothes priced at one hundred dollars or less will be exempt from sales tax. Computers under fifteen hundred dollars will also be tax-free.

Some malls have even extended their hours, but some retailers say there may not be as much of a boost in sales as last year.

Ray Fadool is a JC Penney store manager in Goodlettsville. He’s not expecting as good a holiday weekend as the store had in 2006 –the store’s second biggest sales weekend of the year.

“Well it is the second year of tax free. So the enthusiasm from the first year’s probably going to wear off a little bit. We are certainly expecting to match last year’s numbers, but we’re not going to have the huge increases that we had last year.”

But the state of Tennessee is expecting otherwise, predicting that this weekend’s holiday will cost the state more than last year’s 15 million-dollars in lost sales tax.

Governor Phil Bredesen, a painter himself, toured the Plaza Artist Materials store in Nashville today with manager Bruce Baker. He predicts an increase in sales since college students will benefit too.

“We have 54 brush racks here and again that was never on sale before. It’s not hard for a college student to spend 100-dollars for brushes for start-up oil painting or acrylic class.”

The governor is also using the holiday to remind parents to sign their kids up for CoverKids, the new children’s health insurance program. In addition to this weekend’s sales tax holiday which happens every year, the General Assembly also added a one-time holiday for Easter weekend in the spring.

**WPLN’s Christine Buttorff contributed to this report.**