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Today May Be Busiest Shopping Day of Holiday Season
Aired December 26, 2002 - 13:20 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, it's the day after Christmas, and all through the malls, the retailers tout discounts and exchanges for all.
CNN's Mary Snow following the mad dash to markdowns outside Macy's in New York's Herald Square. I'm surprised you haven't gotten run over yet -- Mary.
MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Kyra. I will tell you, there were a couple of moments when I thought I would get run over. Crowds are out here today. Went inside the store, there is a healthy crowd in there.
And you know, when you see the outside of Macy's, you don't really see any signs for discounts. But once you go inside, as soon as you're in there, see a sign that items are marked down as much as 75 percent off. The counters all have those red signs about clearance items, and Macy's is no different from other big retailers. It opened its stores early this morning. Here on Herald Square, doors opened at 7:00 a.m. We caught up with some early bird shoppers to see how they did so far. We got mixed reviews on the sales.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The store was empty. There was no one here. We, in fact, had the whole store to ourselves for the first half hour. Everything was half off, 60 percent off. So we had a ball.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not the best sale I've ever found at Macy's.
SNOW: Really?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. I was surprised.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I saw, yes, 50 percent off, 30, 50.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There really weren't any great sales, anything really to speak of. Everything we ended up buying wasn't on sale. So it's like any other day, business as usual.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SNOW: But retailers are hoping that these deep discounts will attract customers and make up for lost ground because it has been a weak retail season and Federated, which owns Macy's and Bloomingdale's just earlier this week came out saying that for December, it didn't think that it would meet its targets in terms of sales forecasts, and it will come out next week with its next forecast.
Also, America's Research Group is a marketing firm, and it thinks that today may, for the first time, be the busiest day of the holiday shopping season. One reason they point out is that a lot of the retailers have changed their return policies, have become stricter. So we've seen more gift certificates being handed out, and America's Research Group finds that this has been the best year yet for those gift certificates. So it expects to see pretty heavy traffic -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. Mary Snow, thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 26, 2002 - 13:20 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, it's the day after Christmas, and all through the malls, the retailers tout discounts and exchanges for all.
CNN's Mary Snow following the mad dash to markdowns outside Macy's in New York's Herald Square. I'm surprised you haven't gotten run over yet -- Mary.
MARY SNOW, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi there, Kyra. I will tell you, there were a couple of moments when I thought I would get run over. Crowds are out here today. Went inside the store, there is a healthy crowd in there.
And you know, when you see the outside of Macy's, you don't really see any signs for discounts. But once you go inside, as soon as you're in there, see a sign that items are marked down as much as 75 percent off. The counters all have those red signs about clearance items, and Macy's is no different from other big retailers. It opened its stores early this morning. Here on Herald Square, doors opened at 7:00 a.m. We caught up with some early bird shoppers to see how they did so far. We got mixed reviews on the sales.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The store was empty. There was no one here. We, in fact, had the whole store to ourselves for the first half hour. Everything was half off, 60 percent off. So we had a ball.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not the best sale I've ever found at Macy's.
SNOW: Really?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. I was surprised.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I saw, yes, 50 percent off, 30, 50.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There really weren't any great sales, anything really to speak of. Everything we ended up buying wasn't on sale. So it's like any other day, business as usual.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SNOW: But retailers are hoping that these deep discounts will attract customers and make up for lost ground because it has been a weak retail season and Federated, which owns Macy's and Bloomingdale's just earlier this week came out saying that for December, it didn't think that it would meet its targets in terms of sales forecasts, and it will come out next week with its next forecast.
Also, America's Research Group is a marketing firm, and it thinks that today may, for the first time, be the busiest day of the holiday shopping season. One reason they point out is that a lot of the retailers have changed their return policies, have become stricter. So we've seen more gift certificates being handed out, and America's Research Group finds that this has been the best year yet for those gift certificates. So it expects to see pretty heavy traffic -- Kyra.
PHILLIPS: All right. Mary Snow, thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
