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In different countries Black Friday means different things to different groups of people. For many it is when Friday falls on the 13th of the month, as it did on November 13th .
However, for the United States Black Friday is an annual event, which proclaims the commencement of the Christmas shopping spree.
The day millions of Americans hit the stores, is the day after Thanksgiving Friday 27th November. Some were still dressed in their pyjamas, keen to snatch up the bargains.
Before dawn broke hordes of shoppers formed long queues outside stores. They thronged t like hungry seagulls dive bombing a fishing fleet, in their hunt for discounted products.
Many elbowed their way through crowds, before zooming off to find more bargains, taking time only to text message their victory to a friend.
"We've already been to Sports Authority, Citrus Park mall, Walmart, CVS and Walgreens. I think that's it," Richard Javinett said "This is our last stop of the day," helping to load two $99 TV credenzas and two $99 coffee tables on a rolling cart at Ikea. It was only 9 00a.m.
The initial 200 shoppers going into the Queens Center Mall, in New York, received a $10 gift voucher, when the doors opened at 11.00 p.m. Incentives were everywhere.
Last year the shopping frenzy proved lethal for some shoppers and employees, when a Wal-Street employee was trampled to death and various people badly injured, in a shopping stampede of utter chaos. Two men died when they had a shoot-out in Toys ‘R’ Us in Palm Desert, California.
This year shop managers tried to manage the eager crowds in a more civilized way. The worst fights had to be broken up by police. The staff at some shops walked the waiting lines, taking orders in advance, then filled carts with those items to save customers time, in the hope of lessening the crush. One shopper complained”It was horrible. You couldn’t move”.
Other stores remained open 24 hours, hoping to dampen down the competition among the shoppers. The feeding frenzy was expected to continue through Saturday and Sunday of the holiday weekend.
Accounting for nearly one-fifth of the retail industry’s annual sales, Black Friday is the country’s biggest shopping day. The question remains, will other countries pick up the challenge to also host a ‘Black Friday’?
Many shoppers are now opting for ‘Cyber Monday’ on the Internet, rather than Black Friday in the shopping malls.
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