NEW YORK (AP) — The Latest on Black Friday (all times local):
7:45 a.m.
It’s Black Friday, but retailers are already looking ahead to Cyber Monday.
Target says everything on its site will be 15 percent off on Monday, and it will offer discounts throughout the week on specific categories, such as 40 percent off towels and bedding on Tuesday. Amazon’s deals on its gadgets were similar to its Black Friday ones, such as 40 percent off its voice-activated Echo Dot. But it added other deals, such as 30 percent off Lego sets and 50 percent off certain Hasbro toys, such as Nerf and Play-doh.
Walmart, meanwhile, says it has tripled the assortment and deals it had last year. Among its deals: 40 percent off a voice-activated Google Home Mini, $100 off the Barbie Hello Dreamhouse and $90 off the Xbox One S video console.
Shoppers are expected to spend $6.6 billion on Cyber Monday, up 16 percent from last year, according to Adobe Analytics.
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7:30 a.m.
Friends Yeshica Jeffers and Stacey Rhodes-Sofer hit a Walmart in suburban Albany, New York, before dawn.
Jeffers says it’s a tradition, but it was more fun before stores started opening on Thanksgiving. Both women were adamant that Thanksgiving Day was for families and not for getting a jump start on holiday shopping.
Rhodes-Sofer said she was buying cosmetics for her 20-year-old daughter and books for her goddaughters — Jeffers’ twins. Also on the shopping list: kitchen gadgets and fishing gear for her husband.
Both said they were spending more this year, especially Jeffers now that her daughters were into reading and science.
And both women said they’ll still do plenty of online shopping, especially through Amazon
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6:45 a.m.
As shoppers begin their holiday buying in earnest, some popular items appear to be TVs, electronics and toys like Hatchimals.
Target said in a post on its website that popular deals included several big-screen TVs. In toys, it cited BattleBots and Hatchimals.
Greg Foran, CEO of Walmart’s U.S. division, said Thursday that in the company’s online sales that began just after midnight on Thanksgiving, a broad range of deals from toys to TVs to slow cookers and Google Home mini gadgets took off.
Linda Adair, who was shopping Thursday at a J.C. Penney in Columbia, Missouri, came with her husband from nearby Boonville to buy presents for charity and family, mainly clothing for the couple’s grandchildren. She said in-demand toys include fidget spinners and Hatchimals, although she jokingly said the latter is overpriced and her granddaughter “is not getting one from us.”
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5:30 a.m.
Workers at a half dozen Amazon distribution centers in Germany and one in Italy walked off the job Friday, in a protest timed to coincide with “Black Friday” to demand better wages from the American online giant.
In Germany, Ver.di union spokesman Thomas Voss said some 2,500 workers were on strike at Amazon facilities in Bad Hersfeld, Leipzig, Rheinberg, Werne, Graben and Koblenz. In a warehouse near Piacenza, in northern Italy, some workers walked off the job to demand “dignified salaries.”
The German union has been leading a push since 2013 for higher pay for some 12,000 workers in Germany, arguing Amazon employees receive lower wages than others in retail and mail-order jobs. Amazon says its distribution warehouses in Germany are logistics centers and employees earn relatively high wages for that industry.
The strikes in Germany are expected to end Saturday.
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12:05 a.m.
Stores are hoping deals and excitement bring shoppers to stores and to their sites for Black Friday, one of the biggest shopping days of the year.
But Black Friday has morphed from a single day when people got up early to score doorbusters into a whole season of deals, so shoppers may feel less need to be out. Some love the excitement. Others may check their phones and go back to sleep. But the Thanksgiving weekend, when stores go all-out to attract shoppers, can be an indication of how they’ll do through the season.
With the jobless rate at a 17-year-low of and consumer confidence stronger, analysts project healthy sales increases for November and December. Analysts at Bain say Amazon is expected to take half of the season’s sales growth.
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