By Rebecca Goldfine,Staff Writer

If women are buying pearls, it means the economy is a bit haggard, according to popular lore.

And at Lola’s Boutique on Main Street in Norway, owner Lorrie Bean said that soon after she received a new order of jewelry, she sold three sets of pearls, more than any other type of jewel.

Bean explained that in leaner times, women are said to prefer classic, traditional objects that represent a bygone and possibly less anxious time.

Some shop owners in the area are preparing for a holiday shopping season that might feel the pinch of high heat and gas bills. But some merchants are hopeful that this season will be busy for them.

“I’m hoping the high gas prices will help my business,” said Erica Jed, owner of Books-N-Things in Oxford. “They won’t want to drive to Portland. They’ll shop locally.”

With this in mind, the Norway Business Association has run a radio advertisement to persuade people to shop closer to home.

“Why spend more money than you have to – gas is expensive,” the ad starts out. “So shopping local makes sense.”

Lesley Dean, the Norway Business Association’s vice president and manager of L.F. Pike & Son, a Main Street men’s clothing store in Norway, said this season might be a “socks and underwear” Christmas.

During sock-and-underwear seasons, people want their friends and family to know they care about them, but they shop with practicality in mind, Dean said.

When a woman is buying gifts for a man and deciding between “a sweater that’s a Saturday-night thing and a sweatshirt that is a five-day a week at work thing,” she’ll choose the sweatshirt, Dean said. “When money is tight, people go back to the basics.”

In this vein, Lynn Herrick at The Candle Place in Oxford said she has cut back on holiday items and boosted regular inventory, like kitchen accessories. “If they’re going to put their money out, they’re going to buy something more usable that they can use all through the year,” Herrick said.

Mike Rogers, store manager at Paris Farmers Union, said he has noticed that people are buying as much as usual the items they cannot do without, such as animal food, but they are making the trip to his store less frequently.

“They wait until they need four or five things,” Rogers said. “To cut down on visits.”

Dean also mused about the possibility that people might be affected by Hurricane Katrina and other recent global disasters, which could inspire them to either increase the numbers of people they shop for, or cut back on spending.

Shoppers might want to show more people they appreciate them, or they might have donated their extra dollars for disaster relief, Dean theorized.

One habit will not change, according to Betty Jordan at Prime Cuts in Norway: haircuts and manicures.

“With women, when it comes to getting your hair done and nails done, they won’t stop,” she said, as she fluffed the hair on a client. “It’s a priority.”