“It’s a great experience and um a lot of my sisters said they would never come out on Black Friday and I was fearless, but it’s great”, shopper Barbara Rigby said. Of that number, 74 percent will shop on Black Friday itself. It took eight minutes for all to enter the store.
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Hull shoppers didn’t fall victim to Black Friday fever despite a host of early openings and sale across the city.
According to a survey from the National Retail Federation (NRF), an estimated 135.8 million shoppers will “definitely” or “maybe” shop on Thanksgiving, Black Friday and this coming weekend. And in the last few years, they’ve opened locations on Thanksgiving Day, a once-sacred holiday from retail. They usually start after their Thanksgiving meal and keep going until they finish their shopping.
While people used to line up on Friday for the early-morning doorbuster deals, it’s becoming a late-night affair.
Store manager Brian Shedd said this year, electronics are a big hit. “I love Black Friday but I’m not all about the chaos”, said shopper Kandy Pike.
Of course, there would be no Black Friday without some of the madness that goes hand in hand.
“I went to Walmart and bought a vacuum, that was half price so that’s a good thing”.
Monroeville Mall spokesperson Stacey Keating said shoppers are more likely to be in and out this year. Amazon.com’s sales rose 31 percent, eBay increased 11 percent and Google Shopping was up almost 60 percent. He said midnight after Thanksgiving was by far the biggest rush. The exhausted Winchester mother said she had been shopping for about 15 hours. Jim Silver, editor-in-chief of TTPM, an online review site, said about 10 toys are already hard to find, including certain “Star Wars” toys.
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Stores were opening as soon as 5 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. “We started shopping at 6 o’clock (Thursday) afternoon”, said Jacqueline Chandler, from New Orleans. He declined to give specific numbers.
