Americans spend big on Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a national day of thanks. But it’s also a national day of consumerism.

With just a week until Americans sit down to a bountiful thanksgiving feast most of the action is happening away from the kitchen.

In the next few days we’ll be plowing through crowded grocery store aisles getting all the elements for our turkey-day meals.

According to the national turkey federation about 46 million gobblers will be the centerpiece on the nation’s tables.

On a single day we’ll eat almost 20 percent of all the turkeys consumed in the US all year.

The turkey federation says 88 percent of Americans will have turkey on November 22, with the average bird weighing 15 pounds.

Last year, according to the Census Bureau, the average price for a Thanksgiving day turkey was 99 cents a pound.

But the bird won’t be the only thing Americans will be shopping for in the coming days.

Lots of us will pick up some cranberries. Industry statistics show about 20 percent of all cranberries sold all year are eaten on Thanksgiving day.

We checked in with a couple of grocery stores locally. Turkeys are on special and several of them, at 69 cents a pound.

A butterball turkey will cost you 99 cents a pound. That may not sounds like a whole lot, keep in mind you’ve still got to add in the cost of all the fixings.