Christmas lights were a best seller on Amazon over Black Friday weekend - and some of them are still on sale

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• Black Friday and Cyber Monday signal the beginning of holiday shopping in earnest.
• Prime members ordered enough Christmas lights on Prime Now to make them a best seller over a record-breaking shopping weekend.
• If you happen to need some, holiday lights are still discounted on Amazon and Prime Now.
• Find the Insider Picks Buying Guide for the best Christmas lights you can buy here.

Black Friday, like a groundhog escaping its shadow on Groundhog Day, ushers in the holiday shopping season with harried enthusiasm. Retailers slash prices by as much as 75% to their lowest of the year, and shoppers oblige by stocking up on the essentials, now-justifiable splurges, and, of course, holiday gifts.

This year, among the Echo Dots, Instant Pots, Ancestry DNA tests, books by Michelle Obama, and Bose QuietComfort headphones bought on Amazon during Cyber Week were also a mass of Christmas lights. Prime members ordered so many of them via Prime Now that holiday lights were a best seller on a record-breaking weekend in the company's history.

Amazon is also offering discounts on Christmas lights (most of which you can still shop) but Prime Now may be an even more advantageous way to shop if you have a Prime membership - it has discounts of up to 50% on holiday lights depending on your zip code, and the service offers two-hour delivery in contrast to Amazon's two days for Prime members. And as a relatively new and thereby under-utilized branch of Amazon, Prime Now offers frequent discounts, like $10 off your first order and $20 off your first order if you're an Amex cardholder with the code "AMEX20" at checkout (expiring November 30). However, Prime Now isn't available in every city yet.

With Cyber Monday over (with the exclusion of a few sales), people will begin the happy labor of bedecking the halls for the holidays, leisurely stocking up on gifts they'll inevitably give, and panic-booking mid-January trips to help beat the depression of seasonal cold and darkness.

But if you're behind on the Christmas lights bandwagon - or just can't bear the thought of untangling yours this year - it's worth grabbing some while they're still included in Amazon's Cyber Week sales (which are likely to peter out by November 30) or get some delivered to your door through Prime Now.

Shop holiday lights at up to 50% off on Prime Now for a limited time

Shop holiday lights at up to 40% off on Amazon for a limited time