Best 'Black Friday' deals in years

By Melinda Fulmer

This "Black Friday" -- the big sales day after Thanksgiving -- should kick off the biggest round of holiday price wars in years.

Troubled retailers, in an attempt to woo strapped shoppers back to the stores, are slashing prices on everything from jeans to plasma televisions to laptop computers to automobiles, analysts say.

"This is a very different year for shoppers than they are used to," says Marshal Cohen, the chief industry analyst for NPD Group, a research firm. "The retailers are playing very aggressive."

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Coming off the weakest October in decades, retailers have a lot riding on these holiday sales. Circuit City and Linens 'n Things both filed for bankruptcy protection recently. And some other retailers are perilously close, analysts say, as shoppers demonstrate little interest during this tough economy.

So retailers are bringing out the big guns to pry open consumers' wallets.

0% financing, rewards, rebates

Some big-box stores are expected to offer 0% financing on major purchases. Nordstrom and others are upping their credit card rewards points to get more shoppers through their doors. And Ford is offering more than $10,000 cash back on its F-250 truck.

Still, holiday retail sales are expected to inch up just 1.9% this year, according to the National Retail Federation, the lowest increase since its survey began in 2002. And some research analysts now think holiday sales could actually fall for the first time on record.

"It's the perfect storm," says DealNews.com founder and CEO Dan de Grandpre. "Consumers have cut back spending. Stores must slash prices to drive traffic to their stores. . . . And a $2,000 HDTV pops up for $1,199."

Indeed, de Grandpre says, the last time retailers were discounting this much was at the height of the last tech boom, in 2001, when fledgling online retailers -- backed by big-money venture capitalists -- were practically giving goods away to drive traffic to their Web sites.

The whole store on sale

And with no hot, must-have items this year -- just the same digital cameras, laptops and game consoles everyone bought a year ago -- retailers are cutting prices on just about everything to get people interested.

For the first time in years, some retailers will even discount gift cards or use them as incentives for purchase to drum up more business, says Chris Davies, the owner of deals site Black Friday 2008.

Wal-Mart, for one, has already included a $100 gift card with any $399 purchase of a Sony PlayStation 3 in its pre-holiday sale, a move that may help the retailer get around manufacturer price minimums, Davies says.

Shoppers should also expect a lot more coupons, both online and in their mailboxes, to stack with those sales for an even better bargain.

Many of these additional discounts will be available just for the asking at store registers, analyst Cohen says. So it pays to ask for any extra discounts or coupons before you agree to a purchase.

The deals ahead

Some major chains' Black Friday ads were leaked to shopping sites such as Black Friday 2008, Black Friday @ GottaDeal.com and Black Friday.

But a handful of retailers haven't been waiting for the day after Thanksgiving, which comes five days later than it did last year, to start the aggressive discounting. On Nov. 7, Wal-Mart was selling an HP Compaq Celeron 2GHz laptop computer for $298. Kohl's was selling quarter-carat diamond earrings for $78.

And many apparel retailers such as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus had already discounted their new fall merchandise by 30% to 40% in the weeks leading up to Black Friday.

Continued: Big deals on cars, electronics

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