What people were shopping for in the suburbs this Black Friday
Black Friday means something different to almost every shopper. We caught up with a handful before they rushed home with their treasures.
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No-sweat grandparents: It was a one-stop shop at Spring Hill Mall's Hot Topic store in West Dundee for Jeanne and Mike Korzeniowski. The Elgin couple found all the clothing they desired for their 13-year-old granddaughter's Christmas gift - even a “Gryffindor” hat for their voracious young reader who finished the entire “Harry Potter” series of books.
“We did get a lot of stuff online, picked up some stuff earlier throughout the year,” Mike Korzeniowski said.
“We don't sweat it,” Jeanne said. “If we find it, we find it. If we don't, we enjoy the day off.”
<h3 class="leadin">Minion magic:
Inside Home Depot in Oakbrook Terrace, aisles stocked with inflatable outdoor decorations, LED deer, Nativity scenes, wreaths and more captivated the post-Thanksgiving crowd and kept employees busy.
“I've got a customer waiting half an hour for this deer I can't find,” one clerk was overheard saying.
Customer Anthony Munoz couldn't resist buying an inflatable “Dave,” one of the Minion characters from “Despicable Me.”
“I have one kid ... so whatever makes him happy,” the Elmhurst dad said. “He loves Universal Studios and Minion Drive (video game), so I'm giving him a little minion.”
<h3 class="leadin">Of hearth and home:
Shopping for Black Friday deals might be similar from one town to the next, but for Juan Diaz and wife Tamesis Rodriguez, their first Black Friday experience on the mainland was quite different from shopping in their native Puerto Rico.
The couple bought a Crock-Pot slow cooker and a winter jacket for Rodriguez at Kohl's while shopping at the Spring Hill Mall in West Dundee before heading to IKEA.
“The people and the specials are different,” the couple said in unison.
In Puerto Rico, there are no mail-in rebate deals and customers pay the ticket price, Rodriguez said.
<h3 class="leadin">Tree trimmers:
Bargain-hunters Kathy Christensen and Mary Alvord pulled into the Home Depot lot on an impulse, but their instincts were spot-on.
A short time later, Christensen walked out with a glittering box of ornaments - and a tree topper - at a bargain $13.99.
They won't adorn the Elmwood Park resident's tree, however. “I'm buying them for work,” said Christensen, an assistant business manager at St. Patrick High School in Chicago. “We're getting a new tree this year, so everybody was trying to do what they could to with pick up ornaments to fill it.”
<h3 class="leadin">Spruced up:
After years of faithful service, it was time to retire the Padilla family's artificial tree. Parents Al and Bernadette and grown-up kids Aaron and Shaira shopped a forest's worth of spruces, pines and firs at Home Depot and settled on a Wesley Spruce pre-lit tree.
“The kids have allergies,” Al Padilla of Villa Park explained. “This was $279 and now the total is $191, so we got a good bargain.”
Daily Herald staff writers Marni Pyke and Madhu Krishnamurthy contributed to this report.