Shoppers find few post-Christmas discounts

Shoppers visit Toys R Us in New York’s Times Square after Christmas. Sales this holiday season might have surpassed 2007 levels, a retail expert said. (Mary Altaffer / Associated Press / December 26, 2010)

The post-Christmas rush was on at malls and other retail venues, but many shoppers right away noticed something missing: the huge discounts that made end-of-holiday sales so alluring in recent years.
"Beside the 'buy one, get one free' special for dress shirts, it's the same percent off that Macy's always seems to have," Alfonso Hernandez of Norwalk said Sunday morning as he left the Los Cerritos Center in Cerritos with only a pair of bluejeans.
At the Jos. A. Bank men's clothing store in Huntington Beach, items such as underwear and socks that were on a "buy one, get two free" special last week were regularly priced Sunday.
It was bad news for shoppers but a good sign for retailers.