Naughty or nice? That is the question a Christian advocacy group seeks to answer for America’s largest retailers, rating how they have embraced or ignored the Christmas season in their online communications.
The Florida-based Christian conservative organization The Liberty Counsel released its “Naughty and Nice List” earlier this month, just over a month before the Christmas holiday celebrating the birth of Jesus.
The list, which documents retailers’ willingness to mention the word “Christmas” as the holiday season gears up, is part of the legal organization’s 23rd annual Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign designed to “educate and, when necessary, litigate to ensure religious viewpoints are not censored from Christmas and holiday themes.”
“Christianity remains the largest faith tradition in the United States and is associated with worship, family traditions, nostalgia, and seasonal joy,” said Liberty Counsel Founder and Chairman Mat Staver in a statement. “It makes no sense to pretend the reason for the holiday does not exist or that the holiday should be stripped of Christian symbols and themes.”
Staver is thankful that “some retailers still recognize that the Christmas season is about the birth of Jesus and is not just a winter holiday.”
A company’s placement on the “nice list” is contingent upon “the retailer’s seasonal approach on their website,” the organization explains, specifically whether they explicitly “recognize or celebrate Christmas.”
Notable retailers on the “nice List” this year include Bath & Body Works, Bed Bath & Beyond, Best Buy, Costco, Hallmark, Hobby Lobby, The Home Depot, JCPenney, Kirkland’s, Kohl’s, Lowe’s, Macy’s, Sam’s Club, Sears, Staples, Target and Walmart.
Liberty Counsel highlighted Best Buy, Target and Walmart as examples of companies that previously earned spots on the “naughty list” but are now on the “nice list.” In the case of Target, the big box store was designated as naughty two years ago for embracing what Liberty Counsel described as “‘pride’ decorations that mocked the Christmas holiday.” Target’s inclusion of an “Everything Christmas Market” on its website ensured the retailer a spot on the nice list this year.
Walmart had previously landed on the naughty list for banning its employees from saying “Merry Christmas.” Now, the company is a consistent presence on the nice list for using the word “Christmas” rather than “holiday” to label many of its Christmas items.
Best Buy, which was on the naughty list in 2024, has moved to the nice list after offering several products in a “Christmas” category.
Several prominent retailers found themselves on the naughty list this year because of their efforts to “silence and censor Christmas,” Liberty Counsel says. Those include Academy Sports + Outdoors, American Eagle Outfitters, Barnes & Noble, Big Lots!, Burlington Coat Factory, CVS Pharmacy, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Eddie Bauer, Gap, Kmart, Lord and Taylor, Nordstrom, TJ Maxx and Walgreens.
Academy Sports + Outdoors, Big Lots!, Lord and Taylor and Nordstrom are four companies that moved from the nice list to the naughty list this year because of what the law firm characterized as their embrace of a “nearly sterilized approach to ‘Christmas’ in their online holiday campaigns as compared to prior years.”
Staver urged shoppers to spend their “dollars with the businesses that acknowledge Christmas rather than censor it.” Meanwhile, the “Naughty and Nice List” provides contact information for each store on the naughty list so shoppers can encourage them to change their approach to the Christmas season.
The “Naughty and Nice List,” as well as the Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign, occur in the context of the ongoing societal pressures to secularize the Christmas season by saying “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Christmas.”
Liberty Counsel shared two recent polls documenting Americans’ views on the matter, including a 2024 YouGov survey of 1,136 U.S. adults, which found that 65% preferred the greeting “Merry Christmas” while 26% favored “Happy Holidays.”
The other poll, based on 805 responses collected by Monmouth University in December 2022, suggests that 61% of Americans use “Merry Christmas” while 30% greet people with “Happy Holidays.”
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
