NEWS
By Candy Thomson, The Baltimore Sun | November 25, 2012
Domingo Catalan powered through the Thanksgiving night crowds to get his children toys. He methodically checked all the boxes on his relatives' wish lists on Black Friday. And before he goes to work as a data analyst for a government contractor on Cyber Monday, he expects to look for online deals to have shipped to his brother's family in Germany. So whom was Catalan, a Crofton resident, shopping for on Sunday morning at Bass Pro Shops at Arundel Mills? "Me," he grinned, pausing to jerk his thumb toward his chest as he put an Under Armour winter jacket and fishing gear into the back of his Ford pick-up truck.
NEWS
By Jamie Smith Hopkins, Lorraine Mirabella and Erin Cox, The Baltimore Sun | November 23, 2012
Diane Townes waited in line for 12 hours to get her door-buster deals — printers, a laptop and a 50-inch television — so imagine her chagrin when it looked like she wouldn't be able to squeeze it all into her car Friday morning. The Owings Mills nurse shivered in the cold at 5:30 a.m. outside the Towson Walmart, watching store workers try unsuccessfully to fit her $298 Emerson TV in the trunk and back seat. She finally folded down her back seats and shoved it through the trunk, capping a shopping spree that had started Thanksgiving afternoon.
BUSINESS
By Lorraine Mirabella, The Baltimore Sun | November 17, 2012
Consumers have come to expect the deep discounts that define Black Friday, but retailers hope to entice shoppers this year with more choices in how and when they buy. Responding to what they say is consumer demand, retailers have pushed store openings into Thanksgiving evening as people are finishing their holiday feasts and replaced door buster opening events with waves of timed sales targeting different consumers. For some of the nation's biggest chains, that means turning Thanksgiving Day into the new "Black Friday," sparking a backlash from some consumers and employees.
BUSINESS
Lorraine Mirabella | September 25, 2012
Holiday sales are expected to rise 3 percent in November and December compared to the last two months of 2011, a trade group for the shopping center industry is forecasting. The expected increase is pegged to an index measuring sales at chain stores open at least a year. The forecast released Tuesday by The International Council of Shopping Centers also calls for slight increases in sales at shopping centers and in sales at stores selling general merchandise, apparel and accessories, furniture and other items.
NEWS
By Michelle Deal-Zimmerman and The Baltimore Sun | October 7, 2011
First of all, Southwest Airlines needs to get with my schedule. I expect to see airfare sales on Tuesdays. When the airline launches them on Fridays, it gets me all frazzled. Routine, people. But the sale Southwest announced today is anything but routine. It features airfares for holiday travel - from Dec. 13 to Jan. 5. And while there are blackout dates, there are not nearly as many as you might expect for a peak travel period. Blackout dates are Dec. 23, Dec. 26, Dec. 30 and Jan. 2. See, that's not so bad. One-way fares from Baltimore range from $49 to Boston to $199 for a trip to San Francisco.
BUSINESS
By Hanah Cho, The Baltimore Sun | November 28, 2010
Lured by huge discounts and earlier store hours, more shoppers crowded malls and bought online during this year's Thanksgiving weekend — opening their wallets a bit wider and offering retailers an encouraging start to the holiday season. Shoppers in Maryland and across the country spent $45 billion from Thanksgiving through Sunday, or an average of $365.34 per person. That represents a 6.4 percent increase from $343.31 last year, according to figures released Sunday by the National Retail Federation.