Gearing up for Black Friday

Friends, family and feasting are the quintessential ingredients for a great Thanksgiving.

Early bird hours, doorbusters and sales take the stage the day after, when shoppers lace up their running shoes and prepare for a shopping extravaganza like no other — Black Friday.

“I’m just out today doing a little research, seeing what kinds of things I might be interested in buying Friday,” said Renee Allison of La Grange on Wednesday.

Local retailers have been preparing for the monumental day for months by hiring additional staff, printing and preparing easy-to-read signage and stocking hot items to capacity.

“We’re anticipating a big year,” Wal-Mart store manager Bruce Bannister said Wednesday. “In order to prepare for this event, we’ve gone through a lot of planning since September.”

Bannister said convenience and safety are a top priority in for the store.

“We’ve positioned our merchandise so that it’s not only more convenient, but safer than in the past,” he said. “This year we’re also going to have three police officers; we’ve only had two in the past.”

Bannister said the extra precautions shouldn’t take away from the “excitement of the Black Friday event.”

Belk, inside Vernon Park Mall, is also taking measures to keep customers safe.

“We’ll have our lighting on all night long Thursday night so it should be well-lit out there in the morning,” store manager Bobby Wadleigh said.

Wadleigh said the store associates have also been preparing signage and arranging merchandise to be more customer-friendly.

“We are trying to get the merchandise in the aisles or on the fronts of the aisles so we can have it where to customers can find it,” he said. “We also have plans in place for restocking.”

Belk will open at 4 a.m. Friday and give away gift cards to the first 250 customers with amounts ranging from $5 to $100.

Charles Tripp, the store manager of JC Penny inside Vernon Park Mall, said the store will open at 4 a.m., and hand out Disney snow globes that include a $10 coupon that are redeemable with a purchase of $50 or more Saturday. Tripp said a variety of other coupons will also be given out throughout the day.

“Anybody that is out that early is searching for a deal,” Tripp said.

He will have about 65 associates on hand Friday to offer customer services to the masses, but admits most of them will be around during the doorbuster sale from 4 a.m. to 1 p.m.

“We traditionally do about 80 percent of the (sales) for the day between 4 a.m. and 2 p.m.,” he said. “As traffic dies down, we’ll have some people come in and straighten the store up.”

Wal-Mart will have about 176 associates working early Friday morning and Bannister said every single hand will be on deck as some point throughout the day.

“I’ll have everybody working,” Bannister said. “I feel like we’ll have strong weekend because the economy has been weak and customers are out there looking for bargains.”

Bannister said Wal-Mart will not be closing tonight and customers will be able to get in lines to purchase “hot merchandise,” beginning at 2:30 a.m. Friday.

“We’ll unwrap everything else between the 4:30 and 5 a.m. timeframe, so the floor will be clear and the sale event can start,” he said.

Bannister said those searching for a way to plan out their shopping experience can head to the store’s Web site.

“Our customers can go to walmart.com and print a map of our store,” he said. “It will actually show them where they can get 12 of the hottest items.”

Cato, inside Vernon Park Mall, won’t be offering customers any coupons or thrills like the doorbuster sales, but assistant manager Charlene Rogers said customer service will be a top priority.

“We’re going to be fully staffed,” she said. “We’re going to have plenty of coverage on the floor to provide assistance.”

Rogers said the store currently has about 11 clearance racks for customers to peruse.

“We did markdowns Sunday and we’ve got a lot of clearance sales going on,” she said.

Sarah Campbell can be reached at 252-559-1076 or scampbell@freedomenc.com.