Black Friday shopping is off to a swinging start both online and in-stores, according to early reports from retailers.
On Thanksgiving Day, online sales along approached $2 billion. As of 8:30 a.m., online sales for Black Friday had reached $490 million according to Adobe Insights.
Though Thanksgiving Day set new records for online shopping, there was plenty of traffic in-stores on Thursday evening and into Friday morning. At 5 p.m., when many major retailers opened, shoppers hit the streets.
This year, the top-selling products have been HP Inspiron Computers, iPads and Samsung 4K TVs, drones, Nerf Guns and electric scooters and vehicles for kids.
“Our customers were particularly excited about the new technologies we offered this year. In addition to picking up Black Friday favorites like televisions and toys, they flocked to our stores for drones, virtual reality products and hoverboards,” said Steve Bratspies, Chief Merchandising Officer, Wal-Mart U.S. in a statement.
Target announced early Black Friday results which indicated that Target.com had record-breaking sales on Thanksgiving Day and millions of guests visiting Target stores.
More than 3,200 TVs sold every minute in the first hour of store openings, said Target representatives. Xbox One S and PlayStation 4 were also big sellers, with half a million video games sold within the first hour of store opening. Toys were also hot items, including Lego, Nerf, Our Generation and a Jetson V6 Hoverboard.
In Atlanta, traffic at local malls began building on Thanksgiving evening and overnight, as well as into the morning.
At 11 a.m. on Friday, when most stores were open, parking lots at Lenox Square were 90 percent filled to capacity. North Georgia Premium outlets parking was more than 98 percent at capacity.
Mall of Georgia and Town Center Cobb also saw lots of shopping activity with the parking lots at 85 and 80 percent full respectively, as of mid-morning on Friday.
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