Walmart declares early BF victory

Even before its final round of deals kicked in at Walmart on Friday morning the retailer announced that sales had exceeded last year’s record-breaking results with 10 million transactions completed between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. on Thanksgiving.

“We said Black Friday is the Super Bowl of retail, we ran a play that only Walmart could deliver and our customers loved it,” Walmart U.S. president and CEO Bill Simon said in a press release distributed at 6 a.m. Friday, two hour before a new wave of in store special were set to take effect. “Our Black Friday events were bigger, better, faster, cheaper and safer than ever. More customers chose us, we had the prices and products they were looking for, and we’re not finished yet.”

Last year, Walmart said it served 22 million customers on Thanksgiving Day. This year, the company said even more customers shopped its stores, but stopped short of saying how many more. It did say that more than one million customers took advantage of its one hour in-stock guarantee program which was extended to cover 21 items this year compared to just three when it was introduced last year.

Walmart also said traffic to its website was strong with nearly 400 million page views on Thanksgiving Day, including customers who used mobile devices and tablets. The company will be looking for the online momentum to continue this week with 200 Cyber Week deals that kicked in on Nov. 30 and will extend until Dec. 6.