Yale Summer Journalism Program

Tax Free Week Deals Arrive in New Haven

By: Dominique Bonessi and Jennie Mu

Clutching identical shopping bags from Urban Outfitters containing their recently made purchases while browsing the neighboring Laila Rowe’s summer sales, high schoolers Charlli Brooks and Kelly Smyth were pleased to discover that this week was indeed tax-free week.

“I didn’t notice it was tax-free week. I was just doing some shopping for fun and back-to-school clothes,” Brooks said as she shrugged.

For six days in August, from the 15th to the 21^st, New Haveners are spared the usual six-percent sales tax on their purchases of clothing and footwear. The 10th annual Tax Free Week comes as a refresher to New Haven retailers and small businesses, as the back-to-school period is the second largest shopping season, next to the holidays. This joyous time also comes with one exception: anything over $300 has sales tax added on.

“Consumer spending with out sales tax can jump start a recessive economy,” said Vice President of New Haven Chamber of Commerce Susan Godshall. 

Despite the back-to-school shopping frenzy, August is traditionally a slower shopping period for some businesses according to Keisha Blake, the co-owner of Seychelles—a clothing boutique on Chapel Street. Several stores have strategically paired the tax holiday with various in-store discounts. Yurway sales associate Amanda Montanez described how the store’s discounts of 30% to 50% off all items plus the exempt sales tax attracted more customers to make a purchase.

“It definitely helps motivate customers to buy more clothing items from the store,” Montanez said.

“Genius,” said Curt Sutherland, a bookseller at the Yale Bookstore, while evaluating the annual event’s timeliness. During the weeks of August, older students and parents of school-age children are traditionally more receptive to shopping deals.

Various advertisements have been listed in local newspapers for consumers to take advantage of shopping this week. Blake, the Seychelles co-owner, described how she advertised for her store through Facebook by putting up an ad to remind consumers of the lack of sales tax and the store’s additional 15% discount for students.

Despite the good late summer timing, few businesses are actually affected by the benefits of tax-free week, according to some store managers. With most stores already offering discounts, Ann Johnson, the store manager of Laila Rowe, said the impact of tax-free week on recent sales has been insignificant—almost inexistent.

“The shoes are all discounted, and they just don’t ring up to over $50,” she said.

Even if the shops themselves are giving the tax free week mixed reviews, the shoppers say keep it coming. But Godshall said that it would be difficult to maintain a year round tax break. If urban and suburban legislatures were to agree on a zero sales tax policy, there would have to be a huge spike in income tax to keep a balance, she described.

Until then, some Connecticut residents may suffer from envy of certain nearby states.

“I wish we had tax free week all the time,” said Smyth, “like in Delaware.”