posted
I should of known better. I went to BestBuy this morning. I got there at 4:57--plenty of time to park and get inside before it opened at 5 am.
There was a $250 laptop I wanted. I figured since they had 18, I may be able to get one.
When I pulled up the entire parking lot was filled with cars. The parking lot is for multiple stores and a fast food joint, but everyone had obviously parked for BestBuy.
People had blankets and pillows. The line had at least 300+ people in it. It was larger then the line I camped in to see the first Star Wars (what a mistake!).
After not being able to find a place to park before 5 am I left. I came to work to study.
I don't usually shop on Black Friday. Today I remembered why.
Posts: 2445 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
These stores are getting smart with the Black Friday stuff. I wonder how many of those 300 people also wanted that laptop, but figured that none of the other people would get it first. I bet most of the people were there for "awesome deals", and most of them will walk away with something else.
I'm glad I don't work retail.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
The Hubby set the alarm for three this AM and headed over to our Best Buy in hopes of getting a 22 inch monitor and a video game. The line was also too much to handle. The parking lot looked like a madhouse and the adjacent restaurant lot was full as well. I think these people went out to stay in live right after they ate their turkey dinner. It's crazy!
Posts: 601 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Originally posted by mackillian: I'm not sure exactly what it is, but something about Black Friday rubs me the wrong way.
It might be that the name makes it sound like it's a rememberance for people who died in a plague, or something.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by dawnmaria: The Hubby set the alarm for three this AM and headed over to our Best Buy in hopes of getting a 22 inch monitor and a video game. The line was also too much to handle. The parking lot looked like a madhouse and the adjacent restaurant lot was full as well. I think these people went out to stay in live right after they ate their turkey dinner. It's crazy!
I was going for the same monitor. I saw several hundred people at best buy at 4:30 am and gave up. So I went to staples to pick up a 19 in samsung widescreen. They let me wait in the warm entry way and I got the monitor, 1 gb sd card, and jump drive, mcafee and ca internet security software for free, and DVD-Rs. I headed over to best buy at 6:15 just for kicks, and they still had 3 monitors left, so I grabbed one and waited in line for an hour and a half, where they talked me into 2 more packs of 100 DVD-Rs for 5 bucks each. I don't think I'll need any recordable media for a couple years
Actually, I was pleasantly surprised...all the customers were very polite, and things went pretty smooth. I'm sure handing out coupons based on line position to the big discount items helped avoid the mad rush and associated trampling.
Posts: 1412 | Registered: Oct 2005
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posted
My brother and I went to Circuit City at about 4:30 this morning. I'm no good at estimations, but I'll give it a try anyways- I'd say that there were close to a thousand people in line when we got there. I didn't get everything that I wanted, namely a webcam and external hard drive, but I got a couple of SD cards for $3, some flash drives for $4, and 100 DVDs for free. This was my first time going shopping, and I actually enjoyed it, except for the people that smelled really bad. I talked to some people in line and there were a whole bunch of people who helped me out and gave me stuff. :] I suppose it's cause I look so innocent. [edit] Though, I should probably add that we waited in line for about 2.5 hours.
Posts: 1215 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I don't know how much you'd have to pay me to get me to step foot in a store today, but it's not insignificant.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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posted
i got to Circuit City last night at 2:20am, and was probably around 50th in line.
Got my 32" LCD TV that I went there for, plus the free dvds, mp3 player, flash drive, and some movies. the only thing i missed was the external hard drive, which i actually wanted but was snagged up really quick. aiua, you know the rebates for those smaller items are only good for one per customer right?
The whole experience wasn't so bad at all though, i had fun, and got the tv i wanted!
Posts: 8741 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
I have only shopped on Black Friday once...about 4 years ago. My mom and I met my 2 best friends to get a DVD player for $38.00. There were so many people that I hated being in the store, but the 4 of us are very patient people and don't mind waiting in lines. It gave us plenty of time to talk and catch up on things. Thank God Kwea wasn't there though - he has no patience whatsoever! I don't really feel the need to be up and out waiting in line for hours unless there is something really amazing on sale. Besides, I tend to make homemade Christmas gifts if I have the time. I know it's not as cool as getting a portable DVD player, or XBox 360, but it is pretty neat to get a basket with a jar of homemade cinnamon honey butter, cinnamon orange honey butter, and made from scratch English muffins, along with hand made Victorian Christmas ornaments. This year I am doing hand painted ornaments and somewhere close to 100 dozen cookies. (I already made 19 dozen peanut butter blossoms [the peanut butter cookie with the Hershey kiss on top] 2 days ago as they are Kwea's favorite!)
I was awake at 3am to make sure Kwea got up and out the door. He had to be at work at 4am as he is a manager, while I snuggled back down under the covers and fell back asleep. Tis the season and all. Tomorrow I will start to decorate for the Holidays. The Christmas CDs will come out of hiding for the first time since July - when I last listened to them (it's a strange tradition)and the smell of cookies will fill the air. Happy Holidays!
Posts: 325 | Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
I'm about to go brave Black Friday because I really need a dishwasher. Like, right this second. My current dishwasher is 25 years old...'nuff said.
My biggest problem with Black Friday is people who think it's okay to drag their screaming kids around. And then they let the kids run amok because they're too busy shopping for hours to watch them (hi, hire a babysitter), and then when the kid runs in front of my cart and I can't see him over the box I'm pushing around, the parent comes after MY jugular.
posted
Gah, check your local Craigslist. Seems the resellers really wanted to sink their teeth into this year's black friday ads. Most of them are even using pictures of the ads with the black friday prices.
I wonder how many of them realize that the prices they're asking are not only LUDICROUS, but easily beatable by anynumber of internetretailers.Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by pH: I'm about to go brave Black Friday because I really need a dishwasher. Like, right this second. My current dishwasher is 25 years old...'nuff said.
My current dishwasher is 22 years old, but I don't think I'll be getting rid of mine any time soon. Mostly because cutting off my hands would hurt. Posts: 3852 | Registered: Feb 2002
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quote:Originally posted by pH: My biggest problem with Black Friday is people who think it's okay to drag their screaming kids around. And then they let the kids run amok because they're too busy shopping for hours to watch them (hi, hire a babysitter), and then when the kid runs in front of my cart and I can't see him over the box I'm pushing around, the parent comes after MY jugular.
-pH
Outside of Bestbuy at 4:30am in 20 degree weather, people had been standing out there for hours with infantsPosts: 1412 | Registered: Oct 2005
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posted
Personally, I wouldn't stand in those lines, in any weather, infant or no. I suspect it would take more to get me there than mph.
But for those who are convinced (and in some cases, it's probably true) that the only way they will be able to afford Xmas gifts is by shopping today's sales, they probably can't afford a babysitter either. Which doesn't mean they should let their kids run loose. But it does mean that you two (BQT and pH) might go a bit lighter on the judginess, hmm?
(Or, y'know, what mph said.)
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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it gets it's name from the belief that business who have been operating "in the red" (not making a profit) all year, will sell enough at the beginning of the Christmas season to be "back in the black" (profit-wise) today.
quote:Originally posted by Strider: i normally do my black friday shopping online, but missed the deal on the tv i wanted this year, and have had my sites set on an LCD tv.
Forget xmas presents, black friday is all about me!
And that's just NewEgg. TigerDirect has a bunch of really good stuff too, although most of it's out of stock.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
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We've been celebrating it since we got married. I think I celebrated it the year before that, too, but I'm not sure.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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posted
Got it covered, Strider, thanks. One in my brother's name, one in my dad's, one in mine.. But now that I think of it.. I charged two, though separately, to the same credit card. Will that be a problem? I've got different addresses..
Posts: 1215 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
If you can afford to go blow money today, I don't care how poor you think you are, you can afford to pay a teenager twenty bucks to watch your kid. Oh, maybe you'll have to buy one less stupid thing. Tragic.
quote:Originally posted by Strider: i normally do my black friday shopping online, but missed the deal on the tv i wanted this year, and have had my sites set on an LCD tv.
Forget xmas presents, black friday is all about me!
posted
thanks erso, but i was only saying that in regards to why i went and waited in line rather than buying it online earlier. I got my tv and will now be satisfied for a at least a week or two. Posts: 8741 | Registered: Apr 2001
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quote:Originally posted by pH: If you can afford to go blow money today, I don't care how poor you think you are, you can afford to pay a teenager twenty bucks to watch your kid. Oh, maybe you'll have to buy one less stupid thing. Tragic.
That was disgusting, pH. You have no idea what other people's circumstances are like. For some people, that $20 might buy several gifts for their kids, and is the difference between giving them a Christmas and not. And not everyone can easily get a trusted babysitter to begin with.
In any case, while (as I stated before) the parents have no right to let their kids run wild, they have EVERY right to bring them to the store. It is a public place.
Deal.
And I hope you never have to understand what it means to not be able to afford $20 for a babysitter. Although it might be an educational experience.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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Actually, I said that a particular thing you said was disgusting. It was not a judgement of you as a person. As opposed to your judgement of those parents who, for whatever reason(s), bring their kids shopping with them today.
quote: And you know what? Some of us CAN'T just "deal." But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you?
Hon, you know nothing about what I have dealt with if you can say that. There have certainly been times when I had a great deal of difficulty doing the whole coping thing. Pretty sure I did my best not to make that someone else's problem, though.
If you can't handle being around children, that is unfortunate, but hardly the fault of their parents. With the exception, as I keep saying, of those who let their kids run wild.
If the only parents you had been judging were those who let their kids run loose (and heaven knows there are all too many of them), I would not have uttered a peep. But as soon as you asserted that your right to shop without kids around superseded their parents' rights, IMO you crossed a line.
I think you know by know that I think you're great. But that doesn't mean I won't call you on it when I think you're wrong.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
I think it's utterly RIDICULOUS to drag your child around shopping for eight hours, and I think anyone who thinks otherwise is absolutely insane. How do you expect to control your child for that period of time? I'm not talking about parents who run to the store to pick up a few things or parents who take their kids grocery shopping. I'm talking about parents who think it's perfectly fine to drag their kids around all day Black Friday. Because it's NOT perfectly fine.
Don't start with me. Really. Please don't. I have had it up to HERE with so many of the things that have been said to me on this board, and I never get to say anything about them because when I try, I'm instantly a terrible snob and a horrible person.
posted
The wife and I were camped out at Target at 3:30am, best friend at Shopko 3:30am, younger brother at Toys R Us 3:45am. None of them had Wii's even though Target and Shopko employees both said they were holding some back for black friday.
Tiffany and I booked it over to EB games and the guy in front of us got the last Wii console, booked it over to gamestop where my brother was supposed to be waiting in line as a 2nd resort, turns out he had other ideas and rather then listen to me went to walmart. Of course they didnt have any so I got mad at him and made him go back to the mall which insisted was vacant of any people, he also said, "You don't know what you are talking about the mall is empty!"
I get to the mall and there are 30 people all waiting at another set of doors my brother insisted he had checked minutes ago all waiting for a Wii's. Gamestop got 5 that day.
I was very mad, but I went home caught up on 4 hours of sleep I hadn't gotten, and I feel alot better about the whole ordeal now.
I really wish I had a Wii, I'm missing out on so much fun. Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Originally posted by pH: I think it's utterly RIDICULOUS to drag your child around shopping for eight hours
And how do you know that any of the parents you encountered did this? And assuming they did, that $20 estimate for babysitting is nonsensical. In most areas, $20 gets you two hours. Three, if you're really lucky.
You can't have it both ways, pH. You complain if anyone says anything remotely negative (I'll point out that my initial request (and not just to you) was simply for you to be less judgemental) to or about you, but you feel free to judge people you don't even know. Your response to being asked not to be judgemental was to be several degrees MORE so. And then you object to being called on it.
I also really wish you didn't assume that every time someone says something remotely negative, that they are saying you are a terrible person. They almost never are. A suggestion that you are being judgemental is not saying that you are horrible; it's saying that it is behavior that you might want to be aware of and change.
If I thought you were a horrible person, I wouldn't bother to say much of anything to you.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
No, what I OBJECT to is that EVERYTHING I SAY is automatically interpreted in the most negative light possible. THAT is what I object to. I object to the fact that when I try to defend myself against ANYTHING, I'm dogpiled. So I do my best to ignore it. I do my best not to contribute to ANY thread where the only response to what I say is "You just don't know because you have money." I can't even express my real thoughts about the damn health care system because of that. I can't contribute to most of the threads here because anything I say is written off. And I'm absolutely sick of it. And WHERE IN MY POST DID I SAY I WANTED A COMPLETELY CHILD-FREE STORE? I was talking about parents who let their kids run rampant and run in front of my carts and then the parents blame ME for little Suzy almost getting run over.
But no one ever considers THAT. Oh, no. Even though it's exactly what I said in my first post on this thread.
posted
Enigmatic and I camped out at Gamestop from 9 pm, were first in line, and got a Wii and 2 extra remotes. They had 6, and I seriously doubt they ended up going to the first six in line, the employees did not handle the rush well at all. But we didn't stick around to find out, high-tailed it straight out while the dozens of other people who had kept waiting even though the manager had announced when he got there an hour prior that there were only 6 were still in line and hadn't found out really for sure that they weren't getting one yet. No problems at all, and totally worth it.
BlackBlade, your brother might have been right that there was no one waiting when he went by. We had people driving by all night to check out the length of the line, some stopping and asking us what we were waiting for, and then deciding to go on and wait somewhere else. There were only about 11 people who waited most of the night, 2 hoping for PS3s and the rest of us for 6 Wiis combined. Then starting about an hour before they were going to open, people started showing up in droves, and there were probably almost 100 in line when the opener came through and told us how many they had. Some left, but more stayed, and more kept coming. They might have been there for other things, but there were several people who showed up in the last 15-20 minutes who couldn't believe that they had "missed out" and seemed to expect both sympathy from us, which was kinda hard to give after spending 10 hours sitting there to make sure we'd get one, and for us to be able to tell them were to go so they could still get one today. If we'd've known where you could waltz up at 7 AM and pick one up, don't ya figure we would have done that ourselves? It was kinda weird.
Anyway, it's a lot of fun, but it's going to be plenty of fun whenever you get one, too. We only camped out because it was a pretty nice night and since we're down in Iowa visiting dkw & Bob this way we got to all play with it over the holiday. The guy waiting second in line who had been told by a store employee this week that they'd have PS3s today was less happy with his experience. He had two kids with him, although they spent most of the night in their SUV, which was parked right there. The manager said they had gotten 2 PS3s in as their last shipment, and they had been reserved in advance and he had no idea when they'd get more.
Posts: 7954 | Registered: Mar 2004
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quote:Originally posted by ElJay: Enigmatic and I camped out at Gamestop from 9 pm, were first in line, and got a Wii and 2 extra remotes. They had 6, and I seriously doubt they ended up going to the first six in line, the employees did not handle the rush well at all. But we didn't stick around to find out, high-tailed it straight out while the dozens of other people who had kept waiting even though the manager had announced when he got there an hour prior that there were only 6 were still in line and hadn't found out really for sure that they weren't getting one yet. No problems at all, and totally worth it.
Wow, congrats! When I drove by our EB at around 9 p.m. Thanksgiving, the line was...well, not as long as Best Buy's, but worse in terms of relative size.
quote:There were only about 11 people who waited most of the night, 2 hoping for PS3s and the rest of us for 6 Wiis combined. Then starting about an hour before they were going to open, people started showing up in droves, and there were probably almost 100 in line when the opener came through and told us how many they had. Some left, but more stayed, and more kept coming. They might have been there for other things, but there were several people who showed up in the last 15-20 minutes who couldn't believe that they had "missed out" and seemed to expect both sympathy from us, which was kinda hard to give after spending 10 hours sitting there to make sure we'd get one, and for us to be able to tell them were to go so they could still get one today. If we'd've known where you could waltz up at 7 AM and pick one up, don't ya figure we would have done that ourselves? It was kinda weird.
I can never decide whether it's a BS sense of entitlement or a genuine naivete that drives these people.
Posts: 4313 | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by pH: If you can afford to go blow money today, I don't care how poor you think you are, you can afford to pay a teenager twenty bucks to watch your kid. Oh, maybe you'll have to buy one less stupid thing. Tragic.
-pH
Nobody took offence to your first post in this thread. That post was fine. It was the post that I have just quoted above that some people were offended by. They commented on it. This has NOTHING to do with you having money. This has to do with them finding your post that I have quoted above offensive. End of story.
Posts: 315 | Registered: Jun 2002
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posted
ElJay you have to realize that I camped almost 36 hours for the PS3 (in order to Ebay of course) I came really early on launch day and got dogged left and right, and my brother and I have every other day been scouring every retail store and it was the general consensus that friday was the day.
I've spent so many hours doing this its getting really frustrating when people say, "Oh yeah I just came to Circuit City 10 minutes before opening and they had like 10 extra that nobody had picked up."
I guess I just feel like people who have put in less effort have theirs, and that makes it sting all the more because it means I am less effective. Not a big fan of admitting to ineptness on my part.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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