MACON, Ga. — It's time to wrap up Thanksgiving and start your holiday season shopping - and many people in Central Georgia got started immediately.
For Black Friday in Macon, several families shopped around town and enjoyed the yearly tradition.
Holiday buyers turned out early on Black Friday, and the Adams family drove hours to start their winter shopping.
“It's been a really good morning," Hugh Adams said. "We drove from about an hour away. We come here - I want to say every year - but we come here most of the time. We love shopping in this area,” Adams said
For other shoppers like Jackie Woos, finding what she had an eye out for was the highlight of the day.
“It's a good deal and we're enjoying ourselves shopping and people here are really on the ball,” Woos said.
Nakita Howell has worked for Belk for 13 years, and says today she saw the most customers she has seen since the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This has been the busiest day of the week, I think everyone has been getting ready for the holidays so now they are ready to go and they're out and we are super excited,” Howell said.
According to the National Retail Federation, the Thanksgiving holiday weekend is one of the busiest shopping periods of the year.
Nearly 184 million people plan to shop in-store and online from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday. That's 18 million people more than five years ago.
“We couldn't wait for this day to come, and we are just rejoicing and enjoying our clients and our customers,” Howell said.
Howell said people lined up outside Belk's door hours before it opened to get their Black Friday shopping done.