SHOPPING DOORS WILL OPEN AS THANKSGIVING TURNS TO BLACK FRIDAY


Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
By DORIS HAJEWSKI
Nov. 3, 2006

Thanksgiving leftovers will barely be cold when the first local mall opens for holiday shopping this year - the Prime Outlet Mall at Pleasant Prairie will open at midnight.

Midnight openings on Thanksgiving night are a growing trend across the country, but the Prime Outlet announcement in Kenosha County makes it the first of its kind in southeastern Wisconsin.

None of the major malls in the Milwaukee area will follow suit this year, their managers said.

The Prime Outlet at Pleasant Prairie will remain open for 21 hours straight, starting at 12 a.m., Nov. 23, at the beginning of Black Friday, one of the busiest shopping days of the year. It is one of 12 Prime Outlets on that schedule this year.

Prime Outlets, based in Baltimore, is working with hotels and motels near the 12 malls to create shop and stay programs where guests can receive vouchers or show their room keys to get coupon books.

Three hotels in the Kenosha area are participating: the Radisson, which is on the mall property, the Best Western Harborside in downtown Kenosha, and the Holiday Inn in Pleasant Prairie.

"You wouldn't believe the people who are bringing their families," mall marketing manager Darcy Kennelly said of the initial response to the program.

The first 500 shoppers at the Pleasant Prairie mall will get goodie bags, and five of the bags will have $500 shopping spree certificates, Kennelly said.

Mall operators around the country started experimenting with the midnight openings several years ago and have expanded the number of centers as shoppers have embraced the idea.

General Growth Properties Inc. in Chicago, which operates Mayfair, has opened a few of its centers at midnight before Black Friday for about four years, said David Keating, director of corporate communications.

Last year, at The Maine Mall in Portland, Maine, 30,000 people showed up to shop at midnight, Keating said.

"They drove from all over," he said. "People chartered buses."

General Growth calls the midnight openings "Rockin' Shoppin' Eve," Keating said, adding that they have been popular with retailers as well as shoppers.

This year, the company will run the events at seven shopping centers, but not at Mayfair, which will open at 6 a.m. on the day after Thanksgiving.

Other local mall openings for Black Friday include 8 a.m. at Bayshore Town Center, 5 a.m. at Brookfield Square and 7 a.m. at Southridge. Anchor department stores will open at 5 a.m.