L.L. Bean is offering free breakfast on Saturday (Nov. 3). Does that mean you can send your eggs back if they are not just what you wanted?

The gratis hunter's feast is part of the festivities to open the new Hunting and Fishing Store, as shown above in its "almost finished" condition last Saturday. First day of shopping is Friday (Nov. 2).

It is in Freeport, of course, on the same enlarging campus that is growing in popularity as well as commercial return.

This was a great year for L.L. Bean, with sales increasing so much that employees will get big bonuses and shoppers will get free shipping during holiday shopping.

Your Scribe posits the following for the increased success: mastery of online selling and a thirst for Americans to leave the electronic gear (temporarily) for the outdoors.

A decade ago there was a scramble to see what retailers could succeed at the new channel of Internet shopping. Bean has succeeded grandly. They have a well-known, well-respected brand plus they were aggressive from Day 1.

The belief that you can still send back purchases helped in the early days. Now the online business is thriving.

My other thought is that an increasing number of people want to get outdoors. It's true that Americans are tied to TV, wireless, video games and handheld devices, but every once in a while we rise up and say, "I want to watch a leaf fall, or hear a brook gurgle." (Actually, I'm not sure that anyone every ran out of the house declaring they had to hear the sound of a stream that day but you get the idea).

So Bean is complying, and making it easier to buy outdoor gear at their new hunting and fishing facility. Its 24-foot riverbed aquarium "teeming with trout" should be an exciting add-on for new sportsmen (or inept anglers like me who haven't seen a trout sans dinner plate for more than a decade).

I plan to go past Bean's this weekend - but not at 4:30 a.m. when its free hunter's breakfast opens to the public.

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