Black Friday hit Durango like a champagne bottle cracking against a boat.
Main Avenue was choked with shoppers, and traffic jams clogged Walmart’s parking lot.
At noon, Overland, a store specializing in furs, was overrun with customers.
Contacted by phone, Renae Muller, owner of Renae Marie, another Main Avenue clothing boutique, apologized, saying she was too busy with customers to give an interview.
Jack Llewellyn, executive director of the Durango Chamber of Commerce, said Black Friday christened local retailers’ most profitable season.
“Black Friday and Noel Night are absolutely huge for local shopping,” he said. “It really kicks off the whole Christmas shopping season.”
He said he hoped that most people, “get into the spirit of giving. That’s what drives their enthusiasm for the holiday.”
Not everyone is a fan of the commercial frenzy that engulfs Christmas in 21st-century America.
Traditionalists have long bemoaned the commercialization of Christmas, with critics arguing corporations have hijacked a religious holiday intended to honor the birth of Jesus Christ, transforming it into a capitalist orgy, solely and soullessly motivated by profits.
Such criticisms were lost on Walmart on Friday, where customers were treated to a dizzying array of discounts on objects whose attractions – beyond their short-lived affordability – were not immediately clear.
For instance, in one Walmart aisle, there was a bracingly red plastic remote-control car available for $10 – while supplies last; next to it, a Lego Bucket was selling for $15.
In another aisle, DVDs were on sale for $5 – a deal to be sure, though film buffs would recognize few of the titles.
Like many of the retail titans, Walmart’s Black Friday promotions make buying wares for Christmas seem morally urgent, and the breadth of their discounts promise customers that they can find something for everyone – at a bargain rate.
Which begs the ultimate Black Friday question: What would Jesus buy?
Llewellyn, who did not shop on Black Friday, but instead spent the day at home languishing in his pajamas, said he wasn’t sure.
“That’s a strange question,” he said, laughing.
While buying for the son of God is difficult (What do you get the messiah who has everything?), Jesus, a carpenter, might have been interested in the various items on sale at Kroegers Ace Hardware: There was the store’s Black Friday deal on a cordless DeWALT drill, which sold for $99.99, with two batteries included.
Or he might have hankered after a Stanley folding sawhorse, on sale at Kroegers for $19.99.
(He would have had to have gotten to the store early. Staff members said they had sold out of most Black Friday promotions shortly after 10 a.m.)
Greg Stelz, of Wagon Wheel Liquor, said the store didn’t have any Black Friday promotions.
Though Stelz noted Jesus’ historic weakness for red wine, he doubted that Jesus would be sufficiently intrigued in a 2011 Murphy Goode Homefront Red as to pay $12.99 for it.
“Jesus wouldn’t buy wine. He’d just make it,” Stelz said.
At Brown’s Shoe Fit Co., employee Tami Snyder said the store had been unbelievably busy throughout Friday.
While Jesus is frequently depicted wearing sandals in Western art, Snyder said none were on sale as part of Black Friday, saying they tended to be summer purchases.
But she said if Jesus were in Durango, she’d advise him to buy sturdier shoes.
“He definitely wouldn’t be looking for sandals,” she said. “It’s too chilly for sandals, in my opinion.”
He might instead invest in a pair of warm winter boots, then take advantage of the store’s Black Friday promotion on wool socks – buy three SmartWool socks, and get a fourth pair free.
At Maria’s Bookshop, Clint McKnight said a number of titles are 15 percent off until Thursday as part of Shop Indy, a national celebration by independent book stores.
McKnight said the store stocks a number of Bibles, but they are not on sale. McKnight said he doubted that Jesus would be interested in purchasing the Bible.
“I sort of feel like he was a humble guy who probably wouldn’t want to read about himself – that’s just my impression,” McKnight said.
He said he also felt that Jesus would be uncomfortable with the entire Black Friday hulaballoo.
“He was all about overturning the money, and the temple, and those money-changer tables,” McKnight said, referring to one of the rare biblical episodes where Jesus, whose gentle temperament is famous, lost his cool and overturned marble tables to protest the venality of unscrupulous merchants.
“He wasn’t about buying stuff,” McKnight said.
cmcallister@durangoherald.com
