Crossing the pond for deals
Irish women fly the Atlantic to visit their shopping mecca in Wrentham
They flew almost 3,000 miles to go to the mall.
Thirteen women from Limerick, Ireland, fanned out across the OshKosh store at the Wrentham Village Premium Outlets, quickly sizing up racks of pint-sized fleeces and corduroys, gravitating to signs offering 40 to 50 percent off. Before long, their shopping baskets were stuffed, their arms draped with big bargains.
''Are you ladies just starting?" the cashier asked as they made their way through checkout. It wasn't yet noon on an unseasonably warm Friday, and she was ringing up $360 worth of clothing that one woman had picked out for her children back home.
Indeed, OshKosh was only the first stop for this energetic troupe, who would go on to spend the whole day -- and an estimated $20,000 -- at the stores before returning to their Boston hotel.
Their plan for the next day? More shopping.
''We're here on a mission," Mary Delahunty said.
Forget the Freedom Trail. Never mind the Battle Green. Shopping has become a favored activity for travelers visiting America, where a weak dollar has meant better deals than ever. While some may find it hard to believe that tourists would trek all the way to the United States just to shop, state tourism leaders and mall owners have embraced the trend and are selling Massachusetts as a shopping destination. Consumer playgrounds like Wrentham Village, which attracts 9 million visitors a year, play a starring role in their pitch.
''It's always been a bargain here," said Susan Bladd, marketing manager for the Wrentham outlets. ''Now it's even more of a bargain."
According to the state Office of Travel and Tourism, about 1.5 million foreign tourists visit the Bay State each year. The outlet mall doesn't know how many international tourists are among its customers, but Bladd says visitors from Germany, Japan, South America, England, Scotland, and Ireland regularly travel there.
Welcome messages are broadcast on the mall's loudspeakers in German, Japanese, and Spanish, as well as English. Signs in Japanese advertise a special deal with the Japanese branch of Visa. Bladd said the outlets also offer handy amenities for travelers, such as help on converting to American clothing sizes and lockers for stashing gear.
Massachusetts has become a popular destination for British tourists, in particular, said Larry Meehan, director of tourism for the Greater Boston Convention and Visitors Bureau, both because of the exchange rate and because it is a quick and increasingly cheap flight across the Atlantic.
''There isn't any question that there's a whole other tea party that's happening here," said Meehan, who recently traveled to England to market Massachusetts attractions at a travel industry trade show. ''The pond is getting smaller and smaller and smaller."
The Irish women, mostly homemakers, booked their round-trip flights to Boston on Aer Lingus in January for less than $300 apiece. By sharing four hotel rooms during their recent stay -- which lasted from a Thursday to a Monday -- they kept their travel costs to about $440 a person, they said.
The women agreed it was a small price to pay, given that a pair of Levi's could cost the equivalent of $90 at home. Here, 40-year-old Karen McNamara said, she could buy eight pairs for $200. Katrina Quilligan, 32, who had brought cutouts of her children's footprints to facilitate shoe shopping, said Timberland boots that cost $120 at home could cost as little as $40 here.
''That was only $200," said Mary Malone, 38, coming out of OshKosh with her tote packed full. ''Brilliant, absolutely brilliant."
The group moved from store to store, wearing Joseph Abboud T-shirts that the mall had given them as part of a special goody bag. They toted their loot in rolling carts, which became the envy of many other shoppers, and planned to pack it all into several suitcases for the trip home. They would take their chances with strict Irish customs regulations.
Audrey Tucker, 38, said the women do shop for clothes in Ireland and come here largely for designer-label goods. Each woman brought between $2,500 and $3,000 in cash, dutifully saved in a joint account they called ''the Boston fund." After OshKosh, they planned to hit Timberland, Baby Gap, and the popular
Wrentham Village has been mentioned in foreign papers including The Times of London and the Sunday Telegraph.
''This shopping mecca is 35 miles southwest of Boston and, quite literally, has everything," a 2003 story from The Herald, a newspaper in Glasgow, Scotland, reported. ''Buying a new wardrobe has never seemed such a good idea."
Tourism officials say word of mouth and the Internet are equally important means of advertising. The Irish women have visited several American outlet malls, which they researched online, and have settled on Wrentham as their favorite. They estimate they have visited it for the past six years and have encouraged other groups from their hometown to visit as well.
With 170 stores, Wrentham Village is the second largest outlet mall owned by New Jersey-based
''We have seen an opportunity for growth," she said.
Chelsea's website, for example, offers shopping tour information in Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish. Recognizing the high number of Japanese tourists who come to America to shop, Rothstein said, the company has also opened five malls in Japan. It will open its first in Mexico this week.
Rothstein said it was important to make sure international customers feel comfortable. Guests sometimes come straight to the shopping center without stopping at a hotel, she said, counting on the mall to provide information about local attractions or where to eat.
''If that's your first American experience, there's a bit of responsibility that goes with that," said Rothstein. ''You may be asked questions above and beyond 'Where's the Polo outlet?' "
The mall and several local hotels jointly offer tour packages that come with shopping discounts. The mall will help hotel guests find transportation to the mall, Bladd said, and points them to other nearby attractions, such as Gillette Stadium and the Tweeter Center, on its website.
Overall, tourists spend about $11 billion each year in Massachusetts, according to the state tourism office. Meehan describes the infusion of money into the local economy as ''nothing but wonderful."
''They will eat, they will drink, they will spend more money than perhaps they ever planned," Meehan said.
Local officials say Wrentham Village has benefited the town as well. The mall paid about $1.5 million in property taxes last year, according to the tax collector's office. Daniel Capone, a local real estate agent who sits on several town boards, said the success of the outlets has spurred other development, including new restaurants and a new, smaller shopping center that will be located across the street.
''The spillover is that other businesses now find this a very attractive area," Capone said.
To be fair, Wrentham was not the only stop on the Irish group's whirlwind consumption tour. They also checked out Boston's Downtown Crossing (even regular American department stores are a better bargain than Ireland's, they said) and the North Shore Mall in Peabody. On Sunday morning, Tucker, one of the group's ringleaders, sleepily told a reporter she was uncertain what they would do that day, although the Prudential Center was still on their list and some were considering a second trip to Wrentham.
Although she described the trip to Boston as ''an annual outing for the women," Tucker said the nonstop shopping didn't always feel like a vacation. ''It's hard work," she admitted.
Delahunty, 34, said she had managed to meet up with some friends at the Top of the Hub and was planning to visit Salem. Others said they might check out a show like ''The Lion King."
And then, of course, there were the bargains, which some of the women still couldn't get over. Delahunty marveled at the four jackets she picked up at ''Tommy Hil'."
''I had a field day, an absolute field day," she said.
Emily Shartin can be reached at eshartin@globe.com.
