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Black Friday sales get limited attention in Metro Vancouver

If the lineup at Best Buy in downtown Vancouver was anything to go by, Black Friday in B.C. is not drawing a high volume of shoppers looking for super deals.

Despite an early opening time, balloons and eager staff, no more than 30 people lined up at the store on Granville and Robson streets when it opened Friday at 6 a.m. PT.

Black Friday is a shopping tradition that originated in the U.S and refers to the day after their Thanksgiving holiday. It draws large crowds and is seen by retailers as the first day of Christmas shopping.

In recent years, Canadian retailers have begun holding sales on the same day to try to counter the cross-border shopping trend.

Things were slightly busier in Burnaby at the Metropolis at Metrotown's third annual Black Friday event. More than 100 retailers opened their doors at 8 a.m. PT offering "amazing deals and promotions to shoppers."

Shoppers at Best Buy came for deals on cameras, smart phones or video game consoles.

"The new PS4 is $120 less," said one shopper who did not give his name to CBC News. "I don't know how many they have, I wasn't sure what to expect."

Elliott Chun, who speaks for Best Buy Canada, says lineups at urban stores are usually shorter on Black Friday compared to those at suburban locations. Chun said there were 350 people line up at an Edmonton Best Buy prior to opening.

"This sale began because of customer demand. It's a U.S.-celebrated occasion tied to the Thanksgiving holiday there, but with enough Canadians knowing about the Black Friday, wanting a piece of the pie, we saw an opportunity several years ago to service that opportunity and offer Black Friday."

Chun says this year's sale is the biggest event since Best Buy began offering Black Friday deals in 2010.

Small increase in Nov. sales: Stats Can

Still, recent numbers from Statistics Canada found the share of annual retail sales in November edged up only slightly from 2006 to 2014, from 8.4 per cent to 8.5 per cent.

December remains the busiest shopping month in Canada, though its share of overall sales has declined in that eight years from 9.9 per cent to 9.3 per cent.

Retail industry analysts like Doug Stephens says American retailers are starting to pull back on Black Friday, realizing that many shoppers just "cherry pick" deeply discounted items and don't spend extra for other items at the same time.

Meanwhile, Canada's slumping dollar seems to be having an impact on Canadian participation in U.S. Black Friday sales, with waits at B.C.'s border crossings limited to around 20 minutes on Friday.

Still at least one retail location in Vancouver — the new high-end McArthur Glen outlet mall — was expecting a "significant influx" of American shoppers Friday to use the exchange rate to their advantage after the company took out advertising in Seattle, Tacoma and Everett.