NORTH BEND — At 6 a.m., J.C. Penney Co. Inc. at Pony Village Mall was teeming with people. The staff had already been working for several hours. They opened the store’s doors at 4 a.m.

 Ten minutes later a cashier yelled to her co-workers, “We’re at a lull. You better take breaks.”

The hiatus didn’t last long. Streams of shoppers — yawning teenagers and friends and families, many bright-eyed considering the time of morning — showed up for the sale today.

“We had people in the parking lot at 2:30 when we drove in,” said store manager Laura Ambler. “By 3:30, we had a pack. It was amazing.”

It’s become an American tradition to hit the stores before daylight on what’s known as Black Friday. The parking lot was filled outside J.C. Penney’s door. The lines at the checkouts were steadily about four or five people deep. It was the only store in the mall, and perhaps in the area, to open at that early hour. Others — Fred Meyer, Wal-Mart, Bi-Mart, Big 5 and Macy’s opened at 5 a.m. or later.

The earliest to arrive were Tiffany Eccleston of Bandon and Aimee Edwards of Coos Bay.

“I camped at midnight last night,” Eccleston said.

It was now 7 a.m. and Eccleston leaned back in a lounge chair inside the mall, surrounded by bags. She needed a rest. She and Edwards had already hauled most of their loads to the car.

Eccleston said about 200 people were standing outside the door on pavement still wet from early morning drizzle, by the time the store opened. Eccleston arrived early to get her hands on one of the Disney snow globes J.C. Penney offers early birds each year.

Edwards said she had spent about $2,000, most of which she got from an early tax refund loan. Other items the women were buying were Skinny jeans and sweat shirts. The hoodies were about one-quarter their regular price of about $60, she said.

“We’ve been planning this for months and months,” she said.

Diane Smith of Bandon said the difficult economy didn’t deter her.

“For as bad as you hear the economy is, I sure see a regular number of people out,” she said.

Smith was shopping with her sister, Susan Dunn, who has come up from the San Francisco area for the last six years for Thanksgiving and to catch tax-free buys.

“It’s cheaper to shop up here than it is to send Christmas gifts up,” Dunn said.

“A lot of traffic was coming up from Bandon this morning,” said Smith’s friend, Tabby Haga of Bandon, who tagged along with the two sisters this year.

This was the second store of the morning for the trio who had gone to Wal-Mart in Coos Bay first. Smith said she was shopping for Nintendo Wii video games at Wal-Mart.

Ambler said remote control cars are big with the kids this year.

Mason Murdock Nay, too young for remote control cars at 10-months-old, was checking out tiny mittens instead, rather his mom, Kyecka Murdock Nay, was pushing them onto his hands. She was seeing if he would keep them on before she bought them.

It was the first year Murdock Nay took advantage of the early-bird specials offered the day after Thanksgiving. She arrived at J.C. Penney at 6 a.m. Her husband, Richard Nay, was up early too, she said. He’s an employee at Wal-Mart.

Murdock Nay, a on-call North Bend Medical Center employee, said she hasn’t been called to work as much this year. She usually spends a lot more for Christmas presents, but now she’s on a budget.

“It’s way different,” she said. “Last year I got my husband a tool set. I spent $200 on him. This year it’s like $50.”

Murdock Nay was getting creative this year. She stuffed a fleece blanket on top of the stroller to be included in a movie basket she was putting together for friends.

“Little gifts that make it a big gift,” she said.