In the information age, you don't have to wait for the crashing thud of the annual deal-heavy Thanksgiving Day newspaper to start the holiday shopping season. Now, those ads are on your phone.
The free TGI Black Friday smartphone app returns for a third year to help cash-strapped consumers navigate the door-busting deals of the official start of the holiday shopping season.
"Things are happening a lot faster this year," said Kevin Kahn, chief operating officer of DealCatcher.com. "We're seeing a lot of the ads coming out earlier this year."
Whether they're published or leaked, Kahn and a small team of workers take these ads from the paper and publish them to the web and to your smartphone through their TGI Black Friday app.
"They are really trying to get the information out there early," Kahn said.
Kahn says you don't have to wait for Black Friday to take advantage of the app and the deals his team has published.
Many retailers have begun introducing early specials to attract buyers.
"They're throwing out these really good prices," Kahn said.
As early as the first weekend in November, BestBuy offered a 32-inch Westinghouse 1080p LCD HDTV for $200, a $149 discount off its normal price. Target offered a 12-inch Acer laptop for $197, more than a $130 discount.
Consumers can browse the deals on the app or visit tgiblackfriday.com. There, products can be found separated into categories or by the store offering the sale.
On both the site and the app, users are presented with similar deals and price comparisons to see how good the deal actually is.
But if you're wary of the authenticity of a low price, Kahn's team also offers PDFs of the originating ads - one of the two options added to last year's app, along with support for push notifications.
The app allows users to make lists of their favorite things to save for later or to email to friends and family members. The third integration of the app now includes support for sharing with friends through Twitter and Facebook.
"We kept it pretty much the same because that's been working pretty good for us," Kahn said.
With millions of annual users and high rankings in the Apple App Store, the formula seems to be working.
The TGI Black Friday app can be downloaded for iPhone in the Apple App Store and the Android Market for smartphones running the Android platform.
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