Spencer's Gifts Changes Store Layout, Ditches Some Explicit Items

Changes to the layout of Spencer’s Gifts should be enough to keep the Orland Square Mall novelty store from another fine, according to village staff.

Late last year Orland Park in sex toys, inflatable love dolls, lubricants, gels, sado-masochistic products and sex-themed Christmas items. According to an Illinois statute, the merchandise was considered “harmful materials.” 

Last month Patch reported that Spencer’s had two options: ditch the goods or change the store. They chose a combination.

As of Thursday afternoon, most sexually explicit items were placed on one of three shelves in the back of the store, marked with a sign warning unsuspecting shoppers. A fourth shelf helps block the view.

Besides carving a section for “adult-oriented” products, village manager Paul Grimes noted that Spencer’s has “removed some of the merchandise that was most questionable.”

Spencer's employees deferred all questions to a spokesman who could not be reached for immediate comment on Thursday.

The clerk who’s accused of selling some of those explicit items to minors was back in court on Thursday, two days after her 20th birthday. Her attorney asked a Cook County judge to postpone the hearing, as he did in February. More time, the attorney argued, was needed to review case files.

The next hearing is scheduled April 22.

In January Orland Park police said the charge of distributing harmful materials to minors could be dropped against the clerk if Spencer’s played ball. When asked whether that was still a possibility, Orland Park Police Sgt. Scott Malmborg said, “We’ll have to wait until the April hearing.”