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“It’s been a trend that has been increasing all the way throughout the summer and into the fall and we expect that it is going to continue into the holiday season,” said Rupcic, adding that the mall, unveiled in May 2014, targets the 10 million tourists who visit the Niagara region annually and wasn’t built to cater specifically to Americans.

“We’ll have a lot of Canadians who would be thinking about crossing the border but think twice because of the exchange,” she adds, about Friday expectations. “We are hoping for a lot of Americans too, and we will be doing an additional advertising campaign.”

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The message to Americans is outlet mall prices, Black Friday specials and an exchange rate that has seen the purchasing power of the greenback go from about about $1.20 Canadian for every U.S. dollar to $1.33 since the mall opened. “Our angle is you can save three ways,” she says.

The turn of events in spending patterns has sent Americans travelling to Canada at levels not seen since 2000, says Doug Porter, chief economist with Bank of Montreal. Americans are not just coming up here to shop in malls, they’re buying big tickets items like cars and helping to send hotel occupancy to record levels.

“Travel does have two-way flows. It had been pretty one-sided for years but it does look like the drop in the dollar has turned the tide,” said Porter, adding there has been about 10 per cent increase in U.S. resident entering Canada over the past year. Canadian trips to the U.S. are down 25 per cent to 30 per cent from highs in 2012.