More than 100 shoppers lined up at Belk this morning ready to take advantage of the department store’s Black Friday sales.
Chris Barnette and his fiancée, Alisa Boyd were the first in line.
“We got here about 4:30,” Barnette said.
“My fiancée saw something that piqued her interest, and we thought we would come up here and check it out. We didn’t know we were going to be the first in line. We figured people would have been here at 3,” he said.
Barnette said he and Boyd came prepared to wait and even brought chairs to sit it until the doors opened at 6 a.m.
Boyd said it had been the gift card give-a-way that had drawn her to shop early at Belk.
“I usually don’t do Black Friday sales, but there was chance at a $1,000,” she said.
This year, Belk was giving away $2 million in gift cards and one lucky winner from each of their stores was the recipient of $1,000 gift card during their Thursday afternoon opening and their early Friday morning opening.
Morgan Marble was Vicksburg’s Black Friday $1,000 winner.
“I had come to get a duffel bag that was on sale for $19 and was hoping to win one of the $10 gift cards, Marble said, but I got this,” she said, adding that it had definitely been worth getting up early.
Mary Ann Hynum was also up early this morning to shop.
“I was here yesterday too, and it is just the idea that you have got to come. You meet people in line… yesterday I met a wonderful young woman and she calls me nanna now. The bonding with the people is wonderful,” Hynum said.
“I did it (shopped Black Friday sales) last year, and I will do it again next year,” she said.
Local Belk store manager Eddie Carty said he has been pleased with the turn out.
“We opened twice this year, and yesterday we had about 400 people and today it was about 140 people, and we are still waiting on others to arrive,” he said.
“We are very proud to be part of this community, and we love our costumers,” Carty said. Thursday and Friday’s in-store deals have included reduced pricing in fine jewelry, selected designer handbags and coupons in cosmetics.
“This year we are also doing Christmas cash, which means for every $100 you spend in the store, you get $10 worth of Christmas cash to put on anything in the store from Nov. 27 through Dec. 10,” Carty said.