Shoppers:

Jean and Patty Durham got to Bella Terra at 8:30 a.m. Black Friday morning to start their holiday shopping, and they weren’t alone.

The Durhams were two of dozens standing in a line that stretched around Kohl’s department store, around the corner and back toward the beginning of the line. Despite the never-ending line, more and more people grabbed their purchases and queued.

“It moves fast,” several people kept saying as they moved forward a few feet.

Black Friday is the first official day of the holiday shopping season, and stores rolled out the sales and opened their doors at the crack of dawn to entice customers.

The mother and daughter have been shopping at the day-after-Thanksgiving sales for 25 years. The sales, they said, are always good. Patty Durham, a Mission Viejo resident, picks her mother up in Costa Mesa and off they go, Jean Durham said.

The two started their shopping at 6:30 a.m. at Office Depot, but left without the laptop they had set out for. At Kohl’s in Bella Terra, the two said they planned to spend about the same amount of money on gifts as they have in the past, but for Huntington Beach resident Dawn Rago, that won’t be the case.

Rago said she didn’t get a raise this year and wasn’t going to get a bonus. She doesn’t normally shop the Black Friday sales and said there were more people than she expected, but said it was still worth it.

“It just gives you the opportunity to start shopping early before it gets chaotic,” Rago said.

Rago braved the busy shopping day to purchase a coveted pair of boots for more than 50% off.

“I’ve just wanted these boots forever,” Rago said.

Kohl’s, like many stores, offered special sales for Black Friday. Angl, a women’s fashion store, added 30% off its markdown items. Stores like Justice for Girls, a clothing retailer for tweens, and Madison Bleu, a women’s apparel boutique, offered 40% and 25% off their merchandise, respectively.

At Madison Bleu, the store’s sales Friday were a little better than last year, Manager Lynette Le said. Black Friday also increased sales for the boutique over the weekend, a change for the slow November, Le said.

“It was, all in all, a good thing, and it did boost sales for the weekend,” Le said.