Shoppers looking for deals at giant retailer, Wal-Mart, didn’t have to wait out in the cold at the Kosciusko location on Black Friday, Nov. 27.
As part of a corporate-wide initiative, the stores allowed shoppers to come in and wait in line for 10 hot items – mainly electronic items such as flat screen televisions and laptop computers.
Wal-mart Manager Robert Hawkins said spreading the shoppers through the store for the “hot items” helped congestion.
Those, who ventured out in the wee hours of the morning, received a ticket for their item and were required to stay in line until 5 a.m.
There were TVs by the cold cuts and laptops back in health and beauty aides.
Pallets of merchandise wrapped in black plastic weren’t unveiled until 5 a.m., where clusters of shoppers had gathered – especially in the toy section.
At the end of early bird shopping hours, Hawkins said there were some house wares and a few toys left over.
Hawkins said it was a very productive day at the super center.
Elsewhere in Kosciusko, Leonard’s Department Store’s Rooster Sale was a big hit.
Owner, Shaun Blaylock, said his store had a very productive day.
“It was better than last year,” he said. “I’m not complaining one bit.”
He noted that everyone was out looking for a bargain.
Leonard’s sale kicked off at 6 a.m. with hourly sales ranging from 50 percent off women’s fall merchandise to 20 percent off Carhartt.
Blaylock said business was booming from 6 to 9 a.m. and was steady throughout the day.
He added that late afternoon was big for the 100-plus year old store. From 4 to 5 p.m., men’s, women’s, and children’s merchandise was marked down 40 to 50 percent off.
Peeble’s saw a slight decrease in their Black Friday sales by about $2,000, according to manager Hank Turner.
Turner said the department store sold the most in the shoe department and fine jewelry.
Claude Gunter of Claude Julian’s said his Black Friday sales were up over last year.
The clothing store had a door buster sale from 7 to 11 a.m.
Gunter hopes that the momentum of holiday shopping continues through the season as the downtown merchants prepare for extended hours on Sundays in December.
If you didn’t want to get out and fight the crowds, then there is always the Internet
Marketing gurus have started calling the season a "Twitter Christmas" as merchants have been tweeting deals and previewing discounts on Facebook pages.
This is not uncommon for local merchants as Gemday Jewelers tweeted holiday specials and Claude Julian’s gave special discounts to its Facebook fans.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
According to preliminary figures released Saturday by ShopperTrak, a research firm that tracks more than 50,000 outlets, sales rose 0.5 percent to $10.66 billion Friday, compared with a year ago. That was on top of a 3 percent increase last year.
Online sales Thursday and Friday, however, rose 11 percent to $913 million, according to data released Sunday by comScore, an Internet research firm. Online business got a big boost as stores pushed online promotions the week leading into the Thanksgiving weekend.
The National Retail Federation trade group said Sunday it's sticking to its forecast for holiday sales to decline 1 percent from last year.
A year after suffering the biggest sales decline in four decades, the nation's merchants pulled out all the stops in stores and online to keep the momentum going for the holiday weekend, further blurring the lines between their Web-based and land-based businesses.
