PASCAGOULA — Staffers say the Christmas season was the best Pawn Mart 2 has seen in its 13 years in business.
Retail sales doubled, said manager Chad Bourn, who noted similar sales at the company’s Moss Point store.
Bourn attributed the booming business to the sluggish economy, and good deals.
It is a trend that's happening nationally, as well. A story in the Los Angeles Times in late December noted "two of the nation’s leading publicly traded pawn companies, Ezcorp Inc. and First Cash Financial Services Inc., are among just a handful of stocks that have risen this year, up 31 percent and 20 percent, respectively."
And it isn't just pawned-goods sales that are rising.
"For a lot of people, we're the only source for money," Dave Adelman, president of the National Pawnbrokers Association and owner of Jerry’s Pawn Shop in Atlanta, told the newspaper. "They can't go to a bank and get money because (the banks) won't lend," he said. "Most definitely pawn shops are more busy. This time of year we're doing very well."
Read the complete story at sunherald.com
