AUBURN — With many retail stores opening their doors at 12:01 a.m. on Black Friday, people began lining up at Best Buy and Walmart on Thursday afternoon.

Carolee Taylor of Auburn and her daughter, Debbie McCue, huddled in the doorway starting at 1:20 p.m. as the wind picked up outside Walmart on Mt. Auburn Avenue.

“We’re usually here every year,” said Taylor, who finished her Thanksgiving dinner by 11:30 a.m.

“With the times today, things are tight,” Taylor said. “You gotta do what you gotta do.”

She had her strategy all planned. Her granddaughter wanted the $99 tablet computer and she was eyeing an $80 camera for a 15-year-old going to New York on a school trip. Her brother also wants a television that’s on sale.

McCue’s aspirations were more modest; she was there for the video games.

Taylor said she thinks a lot of people stopped waiting all night for stores to open after a 2008 incident in which a Walmart employee was trampled to death as the doors opened.

Now, Taylor said, there is heightened security, maps and even arrows guiding shoppers to one-way aisles, and running in all its forms is a no-no.

Taylor said her husband would be arriving soon to relieve her and McCue to take a break and get coffee, and deliver chairs to them.

“You usually see a lot of good Christmas spirit in front of the lines,” Taylor said, saying that often people in front will help those farther back secure items they are looking for in the store.

At Best Buy at 649 Turner St., Joe Hutchins and his son, Zane Garland, 14, of Oxford had been sitting in Hutchins’ pickup truck since 3 a.m., their chairs set in front of the doors so the pair can quickly run to them if a crowd should arrive.

By 5 p.m., Hutchins’ wife, Tania, arrived to offer breaks and support for the two.

Hutchins said in past years he would arrive at 10 p.m. Wednesday night to find himself second or third in line. Not a problem this Thanksgiving.

He said he has participated in Black Friday since he was Zane’s age and misses when stores used to open at regular hours on Black Friday. However, he said, “It’s hard to beat the deals; that’s for sure.”

Asked what items he was waiting all night in line for, he shrugged and said, “The TVs.”

dmcintire@sunjournal.com