Buyers go out instead of going online to start the season

NEW YORK – It would have been easy to turn on their computer at home with leftover turkey leftovers and take advantage of the Black Friday offerings that most retailers now offer online.

But across the country, thousands of customers gathered at Thanksgiving stores or woke up the next morning before dawn to take part in this most famous American consumer ritual.

Customers were spending their holidays lined up in front of the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota at 4 pm Thursday, and the crowd had swelled to 3,000 people when the doors were opened at 5 am Friday morning. In Ohio, a group of women were so determined that they booked a hotel room Thursday night to get closer to the stores. In New York, a woman went straight from a dance club to a department store in the middle of the night.

Many buyers have said that Black Friday is about the show as well as the bargains.

Kati Anderson said that she stopped at Cumberland Mall in Atlanta Friday morning to buy discounted clothes and to "watch people". Her friend, Katie Nasworthy, said she had gone to the mall instead of shopping online because she enjoyed seeing Christmas decorations. .

"It's not really Christmas, right now," said Kim Bryant, shopping in the Denver suburbs with her daughter and daughter's girlfriend, lined up at 5:40 am then sprinting inside when the doors opened at 6 o'clock. a m

The physical stores worked hard to prove that they could counter the competition of the online giant Amazon. From Macy's to Target and Walmart, retailers are combining their online and in-store shopping experience with new tools, such as digital smart cards, and more options for customers to shop online and recover in shops. And customers, frustrated by long payment lines, can check at Walmart and other stores with a vendor located in the store aisles.

Consumers have almost doubled their online orders that they had bought in stores from Wednesday to Thanksgiving, according to Adobe Analytics, which tracks spending online.

Priscilla Page, 28, entered her order number in a kiosk near the entrance of a Walmart in Louisville, Kentucky. She found a good deal online for a present for her boyfriend, and then arrived at the store to pick it up.

"I have never been to Black Friday stores," she said, as employees handed her her bag a few minutes later. "I'm not the most patient person of all time, the crowds, the queues, the waiting, it's not really my thing, it was a lot easier. ''

The holiday season is an important test for the US economy, whose overall growth so far this year has been fueled by soaring consumer spending. Americans have increased spending in the first half of 2018 at the fastest pace of the last four years, but retail sales have recently seen a decline in sales. Next month's sales totals will be a good indicator of whether consumers have just taken a break to catch their breath or have been less optimistic about the economy in 2019.

The National Retail Federation, the largest retail group in the country, expects retail holiday sales to increase by 4.8% over 2017, for a total of $ 720.89 billion. dollars. Sales growth slowed down from 5.3% last year, but remains healthy.

The retail economy is also heavily geared towards online shopping. In the last 12 months, purchases at retailers other than stores such as Amazon jumped 12.1%, while sales in traditional department stores dropped 0.3%. Adobe Analytics announced Thursday that Thanksgiving had hit a record $ 3.7 billion in online retail sales, up 28 percent from the same period last year. For Black Friday, online spending is expected to reach more than $ 6.4 billion, according to Adobe.

Target reported that buyers were buying expensive items, such as TVs, iPads and Apple watches. Among the most popular toy offerings are Lego, L.O.L. Surprise of MGA Entertainment and Mattel's Barbie. Players purchased video game consoles such as Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

Others have reported finding more obscure economies. In a shopping center in Cincinnati, Bethany Carrington scored a $ 29 full-length paper cutter to meet her husband's needs and, for $ 17, "Mr. Patato's biggest head I've ever seen".

Black Friday itself has gone from one day when people got up early to score goals in a whole month of transactions. Many department stores, including Macy's, Walmart and Target, started their business on Thanksgiving night. But some families respect their Black Friday traditions.

"We boycotted the Thursday races; it's family day. But Friday's experience is just for fun, "said Michelle Wise, shopping at Park Meadows Mall in Denver with her daughters, Ashleigh, 16, and Avery, 14.

By mid-day on Friday, there had been no widespread reports of transaction-driven chaos that became central to the Black Friday tradition – hand fights for discounted TVs or dead ends. for coveted items on sale.

In one mall in Alabama, two men fought and one of them opened fire, shooting at the other man and a 12 – year – old passerby, who both were taken to hospital with injuries. The police shot and killed the gunman. The authorities did not specify whether the incident was related to the purchases of Black Friday or whether it resulted from an unrelated dispute.

Candice Clark arrived at Louisville's Walmart with her 19-year-old daughter, Desiree Douthitt, looking around and seeing how calm everything seemed. They have long been followers of the Black Friday chords and braved for years crowds and chaos. Clark's son, about 10 years ago, was hit in the head by a hot plate while the buyers were fighting over it. They saw a woman throwing a taser and threatening to use it on anyone who would show up between her and the hotpot she wanted.

Over the years, they witnessed the disappearance of the traditional madness of the day, the passage of online shopping and stores increased their sales from a one-day sprint to a multi-day marathon.

"It sounds pretty normal here," said Roy Heller, as he arrived at Louisville's Walmart, a bit suspicious of Black Friday's shopping, but was pleasantly surprised to find that it was not a big deal. did not even have to queue.

He had been trying to buy his son a toy robot on Amazon, but the stock was exhausted. Friday morning, he frantically searched the Internet and found a robot left at a Wal-Mart, 25 km from his home. He bought it online and arrived an hour later to retrieve it.

Employees handed over his bag, held it and said, "I had the last one in Louisville!"