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| A Woman's Directory For Travel and Life. WAVE Journey is your one stop online resource for women oriented businesses and services around the world. WAVE Journey is for every woman to enjoy. If you love to travel, cook, read or revel in outdoor activities this website is for you. If you are looking to connect with other like-minded women or if you are interested in finding businesses or services that cater to women, WAVE Journey is your number one online resource. Obama Fever Grips DC Shop Owners ~ Vendors mark historic inaugural with Obama-themed products, services Article by Kashmir Hill |
| WAVE Journey |
| Women's Adventures, Vacations & Experiences ~ Your Journey Starts Here! |
Washington, DC — The Whole Foods on P Street had stocked more champagne for
inaugural weekend than it had for New Year’s Eve.
The upscale grocer was also carrying special beers in honor of (then) President-elect
Barack Obama’s home states, including 312 wheat ale from Chicago’s Goose Island
brewery and Pipeline Porter coffee beer from Hawaii’s Kona Brewing Company. The
store also stocked up on Heileman’s Old Style beer.
“Obama’s known to drink it,” said Whole Food’s specialty team member Scott
Witzlsteiner.
Located in the middle of D.C.’s Logan Circle neighborhood, a hotel hotspot, the Whole
Foods is a popular stop for hungry and thirsty tourists.
“Our sales have been way up all month,” Witzlsteiner said. “People have been in a
celebratory mood this January.”
With an estimated two million people expected to visit on inaugural weekend, local
businesses hoped for huge sales, and rolled out merchandise designed for the
occasion. The city gets over 16.1 million tourists annually, said Carla Barry-Austin,
spokesperson for the official tourism agency Destination D.C, with out-of-towners
spending over $5.2 billion on hotels, dining, shopping and entertainment in 2008 alone.
Street vendors sold Obama pins, framed posters and party favors. Area bars had
Budweiser-branded “Official Inauguration Headquarters” signs in their front windows,
and drink specials like the Round Robin’s “Obama Shake,” made with fruit, cream, and
vodka to be “tall and cool” like its namesake.
ACKC, a specialty chocolate shop on 14th Street, was ready for big business. Most
people were expected on foot, and with temperatures expected to be 31 degrees at
most, the shop hoped to sell many $4.25 hot chocolates.
For the occasion, they created a special Choc-Obama drink—a minty hot chocolate
sprinkled with peppermint stick.
“It’s infused with mint because we think [Obama’s] cool and refreshing,” said Eric
Nelson, ACKC owner.
The shop, festooned with red, white and blue decorative fans and balloons, also
carries $8.50 hand-painted milk chocolate bars with Obama’s face stenciled in dark
chocolate; $38 boxes of cherry blossom chocolate truffles stenciled with the
presidential seal; $3.50 chocolate and vanilla cupcakes with the Obama new horizon
“O”; and $15 t-shirts emblazoned with Barack Obama’s image asking, “Loco4Cocoa?”
Third-grader Lelia Dunn, 8, of Richmond, Va., made her way to the register with her
aunt in tow to buy one of the Choc-Obama bars.
“I love Obama. I am going to treasure this bar forever and never eat it,” said Dunn,
who was to miss school on Tuesday to be at the inauguration.
A few minutes later, holding her new bar under her nose and inhaling the chocolate-
mint aroma, she hedged. She might eat it, she said, but only after showing the edible
inaugural weekend souvenir to her classmates when she returned to Richmond.
inaugural weekend than it had for New Year’s Eve.
The upscale grocer was also carrying special beers in honor of (then) President-elect
Barack Obama’s home states, including 312 wheat ale from Chicago’s Goose Island
brewery and Pipeline Porter coffee beer from Hawaii’s Kona Brewing Company. The
store also stocked up on Heileman’s Old Style beer.
“Obama’s known to drink it,” said Whole Food’s specialty team member Scott
Witzlsteiner.
Located in the middle of D.C.’s Logan Circle neighborhood, a hotel hotspot, the Whole
Foods is a popular stop for hungry and thirsty tourists.
“Our sales have been way up all month,” Witzlsteiner said. “People have been in a
celebratory mood this January.”
With an estimated two million people expected to visit on inaugural weekend, local
businesses hoped for huge sales, and rolled out merchandise designed for the
occasion. The city gets over 16.1 million tourists annually, said Carla Barry-Austin,
spokesperson for the official tourism agency Destination D.C, with out-of-towners
spending over $5.2 billion on hotels, dining, shopping and entertainment in 2008 alone.
Street vendors sold Obama pins, framed posters and party favors. Area bars had
Budweiser-branded “Official Inauguration Headquarters” signs in their front windows,
and drink specials like the Round Robin’s “Obama Shake,” made with fruit, cream, and
vodka to be “tall and cool” like its namesake.
ACKC, a specialty chocolate shop on 14th Street, was ready for big business. Most
people were expected on foot, and with temperatures expected to be 31 degrees at
most, the shop hoped to sell many $4.25 hot chocolates.
For the occasion, they created a special Choc-Obama drink—a minty hot chocolate
sprinkled with peppermint stick.
“It’s infused with mint because we think [Obama’s] cool and refreshing,” said Eric
Nelson, ACKC owner.
The shop, festooned with red, white and blue decorative fans and balloons, also
carries $8.50 hand-painted milk chocolate bars with Obama’s face stenciled in dark
chocolate; $38 boxes of cherry blossom chocolate truffles stenciled with the
presidential seal; $3.50 chocolate and vanilla cupcakes with the Obama new horizon
“O”; and $15 t-shirts emblazoned with Barack Obama’s image asking, “Loco4Cocoa?”
Third-grader Lelia Dunn, 8, of Richmond, Va., made her way to the register with her
aunt in tow to buy one of the Choc-Obama bars.
“I love Obama. I am going to treasure this bar forever and never eat it,” said Dunn,
who was to miss school on Tuesday to be at the inauguration.
A few minutes later, holding her new bar under her nose and inhaling the chocolate-
mint aroma, she hedged. She might eat it, she said, but only after showing the edible
inaugural weekend souvenir to her classmates when she returned to Richmond.