This was the country's first Black Friday after retailers borrowed the Friday discount frenzy from the American tradition, but now practiced worldwide.
According to the Internet: "Black Friday is an informal name for the day following Thanksgiving Day in the United States of America, the fourth Thursday of November, which has been regarded as the beginning of the country's Christmas shopping season since 1952, although the term Black Friday did not become widely recognised or used until the 1980s or later in some regions."
Most major retailers open very early, as early as overnight hours, and offer promotional sales.
In Harare, retail shops among them Edgars, Jet, TV Sales and Home as well as grocery stores including Spar, were yesterday packed to the rafters as shoppers stampeded to get clothes, shoes, housewares and cosmetics among other things.
Apart from the retail shops, there are some beauty spars, online stores and sellers and boutique owners who were also offering Black Friday specials.
However, it was the commotion in the shops that caught the eyes of the Daily News crew.
Some of the shoppers were hoarding clothes without even checking the sizes and style and later dumping them at the till.
For others, the sizes did not matter as they could have them altered later.
In some of the stores including Jet, the store managers had to let people in, in bunches as people would gather outside the shops as if there was a rally.
With prospects of getting something at 90, 70 or 50 percent discount, the shoppers had to endure long queues which were snaking in the shops to get to the tills.
But they did not tire, being Zimbabweans who are used to queuing; others went on to sit on the floors as the queues dragged on.
