Sea-Tac Airport Friday inaugurates a new program: Park at the airport garage, they'll give you a complementary fill-up.

That's the least they could do, you say, considering that daily parking costs $26 in the airport garage.

There is one hitch: you vehicle must be electric.

The airport is adding five stalls on the fifth floor of the airport garage designated for electric cars.

Those stalls include a 120-volt, 20 amp. electrical hookup to recharge your vehicle.

The power will be free with your parking.

Among U.S. airlines, SeaTac's Alaska Airlines has to consider itself fortunate.

Its business was down in November, but it shrank its capacity at the same rate its business fell.

New figures from the airline show traffic dropped 6.9 percent last month over November 2007. But the number of seats fell proportionally.

That translates to planes operating 76.7 percent full, the same as a year ago.

One compensating side effect of lower business is that on-time arrivals improved to 81.4 percent compared with 77.9 percent last November.

Other U.S. carriers fared worse.

American's business dropped 14.5 percent in November, but its capacity dropped only 9.3 percent. Its percentage of seats full dropped four percentage points.

American Eagle's passenger traffic declined 21.5 percent. Its capacity decreased by 15.9 percent.

Southwest Airlines revenue passenger miles slid 8.3 percent on capacity that was the same as last year. That meant the percentage of seats filled fell from 69.3 percent to 63.2 percent this year.

It seems contrary to common sense to even think of gas at less than $1 a gallon, but with prices still sliding, the economy still bleeding and workers still being laid off is it foolish to ponder such a price?

Pierce County's lowest price hit $1.61 a gallon at Costco near the Tacoma Mall today, and the average price of all grades of gasoline continue to fall across the state and and nation.

Here in Pierce County, for instance, the average price reported by TacomaGasPrices.com dropped five cents in a week and 55.7 cents in a month.

Oil industry analysts, contemplating crude oil prices in the low $40-a-barrel range, say the prices could head even farther south in January when more layoffs happen and the economy goes into its usual post-Christmas funk.

For the next few days, as the holidays approach, we’ll be speaking to small retail stores in the South Sound region. If you’d like to nominate a retail business for this series, e-mail c.r.roberts@thenewstribune.com.

Best Loved Baby
Address: 4002 S 12th St., Tacoma

On the phone: Ida Simmons, co-owner with her sister Sarah Simmons; mother-in-law Gerene Simmons; and friend Vronwyn Judd.

Please give me a quick description of what your store sells.

We sell mostly natural or organic baby products, for example: Cloth diapers, baby carriers, clothing, bedding, layettes, shampoo and mama care kind of stuff. We also have nursing covers and other pregnancy products – all natural things.

You recently moved, from Proctor Street to S. 12th Street. Why was that?

We just moved here in the beginning of November. On Proctor we were in a small shop in our house, and we wanted to expand because we were growing quite a bit.

How are sales going so far?

They're up a little bit compared to last year, but not quite as much as you would expect because of the economic situation. People are still coming in but they're buying less and being more frugal. They're coming in especially for cloth diapers since there's such a cost-savings compared to disposables. You can spend roughly $600 from birth to potty training for one child with cloth diapers. For disposables, it's about $2,000 roughly until potty training because babies in cloth diapers tend to potty train earlier.

Are you having any sales?

We just finished our Thanksgiving sale and are getting ready for holiday sale, but we're not quite sure what we'll do for that. We hope to roll it out in the next week.

What's the most popular item?

Bumgenius diapers. It's a one-size cloth diaper that fits from birth-potty training. It has velcro that makes it super easy and convenient, and comes with washable liners. It's the most recognizable brand of cloth diaper, so people come in for that brand. Sometimes they end up buying it, and other times they buy other cloth diapers. But it brings people in.

Median home prices in Pierce County dropped again in November, according to figures released Thursday by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service.

The median price for a single-family home or condo in November was $230,000. That price is about $32,950 below the median for the same time last year - an almost 13 percent drop.

Month-to-month, however, it's a 4.5 percent decline from $241,000 in October.

The median price is the midpoint of all sales. Half of homes went for more and half for less.

Other county data for November from the Northwest MLS:

• Homes listed for sale dropped from 1,505 a year ago to 1,368.

• Closed sales were cut almost in half compared to a year ago, from 784 to 463.

Look for more details on the data in tomorrow's News Tribune.