Black Friday shoppers on savings spree

Black Friday has become one of the most popular days to shop for many Americans looking to save a few extra bucks, with the kick off of the holiday shopping season.

The name Black Friday comes from accounting practices of recording profits in black and losses in red, according to the Encyclopedia of Management.

At Peebles, in Marion, preparing for the post-Thanksgiving Day sale begins with the extra shipments, longer hours and more staff to help customers.

“When we open Friday morning the warehouse will be completely empty, it will all be on the floor, priced, ready to sell for that customer at 7 a.m.,” Jerry Wooten, Peebles Store Manager, said.

Staff began arriving at the store around 5 a.m. on Friday to check over the store one last time before they opened their doors.

“We are very fortunate at Peebles because we don’t normally have 500 people that will storm the door.  We are going to open up the doors, welcome them and let them know that they don’t have to in rush to get what they wanted.  I don’t know of any door buster where we have one or two, so there is no use for somebody to try to bust down the door,” Wooten said.

Cars began trickling into the parking lot around 6:30 a.m. on Friday.  Customers began a line in front of Peebles ten minutes before the door opened.

“We came to get the poncho that my grandma wanted. We’ve been to JC Penny and Walmart before this,” shopper Hanable Burch said. “It is actually calm this year. It’s not a big savings but the extra helps,” Burch said.

Another family began their morning savings spree at Walmart before they opened, at 4:30 a.m.

“We were at Walmart and when they opened everybody looked like a bunch of ants rushing to find what they were looking for,” Dianne Gasque said.

When Wooten opened Peebles doors the crowd of 24 people slowly made their way into the store.

“If they want help we’ll help them, if they just want to shop we let them. A lot of people come already knowing what they needed,” Wooten said.
With in the first 30 minutes of the stores opening Wooten said the sales were 70 percent jewelry. 

He didn’t bring his red pen with him on Black Friday because he thought that they would sell four times as much as they do on an average Friday. 

“We got the biggest truck of the year on Monday, but we’ll be getting more trucks the Saturday and Monday after Thanksgiving to help us restock,” Wooten said.