Shoppers flock to stores for Black Friday deals

About 60 bargain hunters, some in pyjamas and dressing gowns, queued for more than an hour at Tesco Extra in Silverburn, Glasgow, which had closed between midnight and 5am in preparation for Black Friday.

But the crowds didn’t ebb. CUSTOMER GROWTH PARTNERS Retail consultancy Customer Growth Partners is projecting that core retail sales will rise 3.2 percent this holiday season to $607 billion, a deceleration from the 4.6 percent growth logged in November and December of past year.

Last year Black friday and Thanksgiving sales were disappointing, forcing retailers to double down on discounts which led to a last-minute shopping frenzy.

If you missed out on Black Friday deals, don’t worry – this year, it looks like the entire week after Thanksgiving is “Black Friday”.

However the survey by money-saving website Voucherbox.co.uk revealed that the best day for online bargains will be tomorrow – dubbed Cyber Monday.

Consumers are expected to click “proceed to checkout” with their online shopping carts in record numbers this Cyber Monday in what is still the biggest online shopping day of the year.

Because we all know the other shoppers are judging you if you go out on Black Friday in your pajamas.

“We had a lot of shoppers last night”, she said Friday afternoon.

“It’s more than we expected”.

“The lines were long, the clicks were plenty and the stores were full”, said Matthew Shay, CEO and National Retail Federation president, in a statement on the start of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

Meanwhile, at Northgate Mall – the Hixson mall also owned by CBL Properties – it was a similar story.

“We’ve gone every year since I was little”, said Anna Branham, as she, Stephanie Lovins and Joanna Lovins sat on a bench in the lower level of The Mall at Johnson City, surrounded by shopping bags.

But in recent years, retailers have started offering mega-discounts in stores and online earlier instead of waiting until Black Friday.

Shoppers spent more than $1 billion online on Thanksgiving Day, 22% more than past year. The forecast combines online and in-store retail sales. For the first time on Thanksgiving Day, mobile phones dominated the online traffic, accounting for 57 percent of online visits, according to the Adobe Digital Index’s Friday report. The company said it is an “estimated decrease from last year” but did not give the percentage decline due to an internal change in the way it calculates data. “We pretty much tripled what we usually do on a normal Saturday, so very good”. “I just want to get it today”. But this year sales on Thanksgiving also dropped and by the same percentage, to $1.8bn.

The Cyber Monday online sales is getting bigger and bigger each passing year.

Greg Bromley of retail analyst Conlumino says there has been a shift towards shoppers buying clothes online thanks to click and collect and more convenient return options.