Shoppers flock to area stores for holiday deals
By LISA M HOFFMANN, & The Associated PressArticle Photos
IRON MOUNTAIN - Area stores were busy this morning with shoppers wanting to get the best deals on anything and everything for Christmas.
The day after Thanksgiving is traditionally the busiest day for holiday shopping with many stores offering early-bird specials.
Kevin Stoltz, store manager at JCPenney said the line at the Kingsford store this morning went from the entrance of the store to the mall doors.
"Very busy, still busy. Traffic is, well, actually it is better than I thought it was going to be," Stoltz said.
ShopKo in Kingsford has also been busy since opening its doors at 5 a.m. today. Customers waited in line to get in the store for the opening.
Although the store did run out of some toys early this morning, including Mr. Potato Head, the store remained busy for the six-hour sale.
Mark Blaskowski, store manager at Kmart, said there were 230 customers in line waiting for the store to open its doors at 6 a.m.
"Yeah, it is going well," he said.
Stoltz added that sales were going well at JCPenney today.
"There's a lot of great deals in the ad, and customers are happy with the value they're getting on what they're spending," he said.
Blaskowski said customers were not really buying any items in particular today, but electronics and Legos are popular items being sold.
Daryl Ryan, store manager for Home Depot in Iron Mountain, said of the past three years, this year was the best crowd.
"A lot of people came in for Black Friday items," he said.
Randy Trudgeon, store manager for Dunham's Sporting Goods said customers waited in line to get into the store when it opened at 5 a.m.
"We are crazy. It's been very busy - still going strong," Trudgeon said.
He added customers were getting deals on pretty much everything, but a lot of exercise equipment and electronics were sold.
Paul Yakowenko, store manager at Tractor Supply, said the store has been "crazy" since it opened at 6 a.m. with customers coming in for the deals.
"We had people in the parking lot at 5:45 a.m. It's been pretty steady the whole time," he said. "It's been real good."
Rocconi Ace Hardware & Supply also reported the store to be as busy as it was last year.
Julie Erickson, senior beauty adviser at Walgreens, said the store has been very busy since it opened at 7 a.m.
"It was very busy. It was great. It's been steady," she said.
Chris Frossard, assistant store manager at Wal-Mart in Iron Mountain, said that since the store does not close its doors there was no line to get in the store.
"We cut everything open, it was kind of a mad-house for a while, but it went," he said.
Frossard added the 42-inch LCD 1080p HDTV for $598, the Samsung camera for $60 and MP3 players for $29 sold fast this morning. The store has sold out of the MP3 players.
Erickson added customers were shopping at Walgreens for the handheld TV game and the buy one, get one free artificial 4-foot Christmas trees.
Iron Mountain resident Pam Revord and Kingsford resident Paula Cavaiani-Chapman said they go shopping on this day because it is a family tradition.
Tina LeClaire of Kingsford said she goes shopping the day after Thanksgiving for the snowglobe at JCPenney. The store gives out a snowglobe, which was given by request this year.
The Associated Press reports the crowds showed up for the discounts.
Best Buy, which threw its doors open at 5 a.m. offered such specials as a 49-inch Panasonic plasma HDTV for $899.99 and a $189.99 GPS device by Garmin. Toys ''R'' Us was offering up to 60 percent discounts from 5 a.m. to 10 a.m.
