Saskatoon shoppers woke up at the crack of dawn to get in on some of the best deals for Black Friday.
Around 100 people were lined up at 6 a.m. Friday at the Best Buy location in Preston Crossing. The store opened up its doors two hours earlier than usual and there was no shortage of people purchasing brand new televisions. More than 20 TVs were sold within one hour and a steady flow of shoppers rushed in and out of the store to get the deal.
Garnett Crivea lined up bright and early to purchase a TV, but the Saskatoon man and his wife said they got a little too excited.
“On our way coming here, I noticed I didn’t have my wallet and my wife didn’t have her purse,” Crivea laughed. “The deals are great. I advise everyone to come here and crash it!”
For others, it was their first time experiencing the Black Friday shopping rush. Peter Ebidero heard about the deals and bought one TV for himself and purchased another one for a friend.
“I'm amazed at the number of people and even the cars on the road, people trying to wake up very early, and trying to take advantage of the deals,” he said.
Rokhan Sarwar, who is a manager at the Preston Crossing Best Buy, said he has noticed a huge uptick in shoppers staying in Canada during Black Friday instead of crossing the American border.
“This year, we’re seeing a big increase in terms of our traffic and sales, and I can see that the weekend leading into Black Friday and Cyber Monday is going to be the second busiest of the year compared to Boxing Week and Boxing Day.”
However, one marketing expert said consumers should still take an extra minute to ask themselves if they really need to get in on a deal. Associate professor of marketing at the Edwards School of Business, Marjorie Delbaere, said people should consider the price and whether it was something they planned to buy in the first place.
“Don’t get too swayed by the value of the deal,” she said. “You should still consider the value of the product and the value of the service you’re considering buying and make sure you balance that out with the value of the deal.”
Canadian e-commerce company Shopify, which has developed a computer software platform for online stores across the world, estimates hundreds of thousands of dollars in sales being made every minute on Black Friday.
