Americans more comfortable with in-store shopping on Black Friday than they were a year ago returned in greater force, and malls and stores reported decent-sized crowds, if not the floods of people that used to fight over the latest toys and electronics.
The shopping experience has been damaged this year by supply-chain bottlenecks that have led to short supplies of merchandise. The biggest draw of the day -- discounts -- were largely disappointing, as rising prices driven by inflation at a 30-year high constrained deals.
Online shopping is common now, and discounts are more subdued and spread out over the weeks leading up to Christmas on websites and in stores.
Overall Christmas holiday sales are expected to grow this year. For the November and December period, the National Retail Federation, the nation's largest retail trade group, predicts that sales will increase between 8.5% and 10.5%. Holiday sales increased about 8% in 2020 when shoppers, locked down during the early part of the pandemic, spent their money on pajamas and home goods.
Shoppers in Central and Northwest Arkansas reported short Black Friday checkout lines.
Julie Vestal, 60, of North Little Rock said she left her house at 7:30 a.m. to beat the crowds, and to her surprise, she did.
"It's very quiet," she said at the Target store on McCain Boulevard. Last year Vestal avoided in-person Black Friday shopping over covid concerns.
[Video not showing up above? Click here to watch » arkansasonline.com/1127bargains/]
Vestal, with her cart full of gifts, said the change is fine if it means "I don't have to stand in line for a long time."
Ashley Stone, 48, of Redfield guessed that the stores weren't as busy this year because more people were shopping online.
"I did a lot of shopping online," Stone said.
Park Plaza opened its doors at 6 a.m. for the anticipated rush. Rebecca Hardman, 45, of Fordyce said her overall shopping experience was good, but fewer people were out than she had expected.
"I think the busiest line was at Bath & Body Works," she said in reference to the store's "buy 3, get 3 free" promotion.
Despite full parking lots at many of the big-box stores in Rogers, one shopper at Target said she found Black Friday "very different this year."
Samantha Alley, who was shopping with friends, said they set out at 6 a.m.
"Typically it's packed everywhere," she said. This year, though, "not a whole lot of people were out. ... It's been great, not a whole of crowds or lines," Alley said.
Joe Lyons said he was in and out of the Rogers Best Buy store in about 30 minutes. He said he'd had no problem finding the gift he wanted for a relative, with plenty in stock.
As for covid-19 concerns, Lyons said he felt safe in the store. People seemed to be socially distancing, he said. Target Corp. and Best Buy Inc. require their employees to wear masks while on duty. They encourage customers to wear masks also, and to observe social distancing.
The experience of shopping changed last year as many people avoided lingering in stores and were discouraged from touching and testing products. Fitting rooms were closed or limited in many places. Makeup counters were not offering makeovers or samples of lipstick or perfume. Plastic partitions, hand sanitizer and reminders to socially distance peppered the landscape. Shopper events were downsized or canceled.
Stephen Arnold, president of the International Brotherhood of Real Bearded Santas, a trade group with more than 1,800 members, appeared at only a single tree lighting event last year. It was a frightening time, he said, particularly for a group of elderly men who are often overweight and have diabetes.
But this season, Arnold said, all five of his tree lighting ceremonies are back, including a splashy event that he loves at Graceland, Elvis Presley's estate in Arnold's hometown, Memphis. He plans to participate in more than 200 appearances, on par with his pre-pandemic schedule in 2019. At times, he may perform from inside a life-size snow globe like last year, and a sizable chunk of his events will be held virtually, but it's a world apart from 2020.
"I think almost all of our Santas intend to work a great deal more than they did last year, and a much higher percentage, probably 65 to 70% of us, will return to what we consider some kind of normal schedule," Arnold, 71, said. "I'm trying to be prepared for a season of relatively close contact."
While Black Friday has a strong hold on Americans' imaginations as a day of crazed shopping, it has lost stature over the past decade as stores opened on Thanksgiving Day, and shopping shifted to Amazon and other online retailers. Stores diluted the day's importance further by advertising Black Friday sales on more and more days.
The pandemic led many retailers to close stores on Thanksgiving Day and push discounts on their websites, starting as early as October. That's continuing this year, although there are deals in stores, as well.
At the Fashion Centre mall in the northern Virginia suburbs, window signs advertised 50% off boots at Aldo, 40% off full-price items at J.Crew, and 30% off at Forever 21. At the Capital Mall in Olympia, Wash., stores advertised sales of 35% to 50% off.
Big retailers like Walmart aren't blasting "doorbuster" deals in their ads, said DealNews.com analyst Julie Ramhold. Meanwhile, smaller chains like Victoria's Secret and Gap are having harder times managing supply issues. Victoria's Secret said recently that 45% of its holiday merchandise is still stuck in transit.
Supply chain hold-ups are a major concern this year, and stores and shoppers are trying to find work-arounds. Some of the biggest U.S. retailers are rerouting goods to less congested ports, even chartering their own vessels.
Macy's Chief Executive Officer Jeff Gennette said the company is prepared. "We are deep, and we are ready," he said, noting inventory levels are up 20% compared with last year. "We are in good shape." But many sales floors looked different than in years past, when tall piles of merchandise used to be on display. At Macy's in Manhattan, gone were the shoes stacked so high shoppers couldn't reach them.
People are much more likely to make purchases when they are at a store than while browsing the store's website, said Meredith Darnall, senior vice president in the retail division of Brookfield Properties, which oversees more than 130 malls.
"The ability to touch and see and talk to somebody about the product is real. They also have add-on sales -- you come in for the T-shirt, you're likely to buy the denim." Adding to the appeal of in-store shopping for retailers, she said, is the fact that return rates are much higher for e-commerce purchases, especially in apparel and shoes.
Plenty of consumers seem eager to shop in person this year. The NPD Group recently surveyed more than 1,000 people about holiday traditions that they missed most in 2020 and hoped to return to this year. About 36% said they missed browsing retail stores, while 30% said they looked forward to returning to shopping in malls and the "Thanksgiving and Black Friday frenzy."
Information for this article was contributed by Tali Arbel, Anne D'Innocenzio, David Zalubowski, Parker Purifoy, Manuel Valdes, Bryan Gallion, and Eugene Garcia of The Associated Press; by Serenah McKay and Nathan Owens of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazzette; and by Sapna Maheshwari of The New York Times.
