American flags, especially the 3-by-5-foot “house” size, aren't flying off the shelves anymore. They aren't staying in stores long enough to get to the shelves.

        Wal-Mart, Kmart, Cappel's and Architects Sales Inc. in Blue Ash have been cleaned out of flags. The stores have placed new orders, but most can't give a delivery date.

        Some Greater Cincinnati specialty stores have limited supplies of house-size flags.

        “We got (flags) in about two weeks ago,” says Sandi McLean of Queen City Awning. “We had a list of 200 people we took orders from when we were out, and after we took care of them, we have about 115 left.”

        “People are coming in regularly, weekends about 15 a day, weekdays two or three a day” to buy a flag, Ms. McLean said.

        “Things have just lightened up this last week,” says Terri Horne, co-owner of Flaggs USA in Oakley, who has the 3-by-5-foot size flag in stock. “But I don't attribute it to a decrease in requests. We've told people that we won't get them in until a certain date.”

        The store uses a telephone recording to list what it has in stock.

        Cappel's expects the 3-by-5-foot size flags in about a week.

        “It's not as brisk as the early stages,” Ray Cappel says of his flag requests at his stores. But, “we have a large quantity on order and various sizes coming in and going out just as fast.”

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