Tis’ the weekend for shopping and Park City retailers know it. Businesses are raring up for Black Friday crowds with sales, giveaways and the anticipation that 2011 will bring more holiday shoppers. From what national projections are showing, retailers might just get what they wished for.
“It’s the biggest holiday of the year for us,” said Tanger Outlet Center manager, Nancy Gray.
National projections for Black Friday are up. An estimated 152 million shoppers in the United States told the National Retail Federation they would be out hunting for deals, adding roughly 14 million more shoppers from 2010. The number of people that said they would “definitely” be shopping jumped from 27 percent in 2010 to an expected 33 percent this season.
“This is probably 20 percent of the yearly revenues for a lot of stores just in the five to six week shopping period before Christmas,” said Kimball Business Association President Tom Richardson. “And Black Friday sets it all off.”
Gray said she’s used to working with crowds for the biggest shopping day of the year. The outlets draw in shoppers from all over the Wasatch Front and as far away as Idaho. “Parking lots are completely full,” she said. “People are parking on side streets and walking up.”
“For a lot of people it’s become a tradition,” she added.
Tanger Outlet’s 65 stores will be giving a head start to shoppers with Thursday night’s Moonlight Madness starting at 10 p.m. The first 200 shoppers will receive a $10 gift card good for any Tanger Outlet store.
And Tanger Outlets isn’t the only business trying to take advantage of the rush.
Best Buy Assistant Manager Mitchell Baker said Black Friday was the most important day for the store all year. Employees have spent the past two months training for Black Friday and Mitchell said figuring out crowd control has taken up a lot of that time.
“Consumer feedback told us people are tired of getting up at 2 a.m.,” Baker said. “People would rather eat, take nap and then go out. That’s why retailers are choosing to open earlier.”
Best Buy plans on opening at midnight with a pre-shopping party as people wait in their underground parking lot.
While stores at Kimball Junction are hard at work, Main Street businesses are only expecting a mild increase in business.
“From a visitation number, we are historically in one of our slowest periods,” said Bill Malone, the Park City Chamber of Commerce president. “However, places like Main Street shopping are a unique alternative to the traditional big-box Black Friday-bargain shopping and, for some, can be a driver for those looking for something unique and different.”
Malone said Thanksgiving would not be the best determiner business activity for the coming season because many of the city’s tourists are holding back until Christmas.
“I would venture to say the sales over the Thanksgiving weekend do not tell us much as to how successful the winter season will be,” he said. “Success by some of the larger retailers could probably be an indicator of ‘willingness to spend by locals.'”
Though online competition for sales is expected to be steep this year many sites will be offering extended sales periods Richardson said he’s not worried about Park City managing to have a good year.
“People love the holiday experience of shopping and being out,” he said. “I know I look forward to it. I like to go out and walk around with the ski areas open in the distance.”