Go Bananas For Black Friday Deals At Lemur Center

While shoppers act wild at local stores on Black Friday, Duke community members can enjoy a more subdued shopping experience.For the first time, the Duke Lemur Center will open on the annual shopping "holiday," offering 20 percent off all purchases to Duke faculty, staff and students with a valid DukeCard. The Center's Lemur Landing store will open from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 25.Items available at the Lemur Center include plush dolls for as low as $5, lemur paintings starting from $12.50 and vanilla powder and extract imported from Madagascar from $11.95 to $19.95."Not everyone wants to deal with the crazy atmosphere of big retail stores, so this will be a great alternative," said Niki Barnett, an education and development associate with the Lemur Center. "We'll offer a slow paced escape from the normal Black Friday experience, but with the same great discounts."Overall, the National Retail Federation expects holiday retail sales for 2011 to increase 2.8 percent to $465.6 billion. Last year, Black Friday accounted for an estimated $10.7 billion in retail spending - about 10 percent of 2010 holiday sales.While Lemur Landing will be open for business, almost all Duke Stores locations will be closed as part of the Thanksgiving holiday. Only the Nasher Museum of Art store will be open from 10 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. on Nov. 25. If shoppers are looking to get a head start on gift buying, the Nasher store will run a sale this weekend from Nov. 18 to 20, offering 20 and 50 percent off select children's and art books.

In addition to the Black Friday discount, Duke employees receive a year-round discount for the "Lemurs Live!" tour. Visit the Duke Lemur Center website for more information about lemurs, tours and more.