Black Friday Sales (1 Viewer)

[Robert_Z]

I agree. My girlfriend and I were discussing this today. We were foolish enough to get to BB at 10 minutes to 5 this morning. Unfortunately about 500 other people also had the same idea to get there early.

We asked the BB manager if they had any of the Toshiba laptops left, and he said no, but that they had received almost twce the minimum. (since the minimum was 10 per store, that means they had 20 max...i never had a chance)

Why advertise if you can't deliver to most of your customers? Bad business tactic.

 

[TravisR]

To get you to come into the store. Even if you didn't buy something, a $400 laptop got people into the store who did end up buying something else. More than likely they're not making any money (or losing money) on the laptops, why would they carry 1,000 laptops when they make nothing on them?

If it says 'Minimum of Ten', I don't think you should expect significantly more than that quantity of that item.

 

[Harold Wazzu]

My local Hastings was having 30% off all their used dvds, today only. I scored From the Earth to the Moon : Signtaure edition for $40 + tax.

 

[EmmaAU]

I'm glad you were able to take advantage of the sale.

 

[SteveCallas]

Ok, I went into a SuperWalmart at around midnight, an sure enough, everyone had cleared out, no lines at all. Also, there were still PLENTY of $3.44 dvds left - every title was available in mass quantity. Picked up 13 Days, Boileroom, and Swordfish - was in and out in about five minutes, excellent.

 

[jim.vaccaro]

Scored an Infocus 4805 (remanufactured) from Staples for $499. ($599-$100 rebate). Sweet.

 

[Jason Harbaugh]

Walked into BB at around 5PM, picked up everything I wanted.

 

[Gregg Loewen]

yeah..the $500 4805 projector is very sweet...just buy at a store that will allow a return for dead pixels.

 

[Jimi C]

"yeah..the $500 4805 projector is very sweet...just buy at a store that will allow a return for dead pixels."

I didnt even know about the deal.. it sure beats my Toshiba. I dont think there are any Staples in my area though. I got a Toshiba TDP-S25. Best price on Froogle is $1,000+, i got it for $449.99 after rebates. The very few reviews i found on it were okay, but i thought for the price it was too good to pass up. Im sure its an upgrade from my 35lb 7 year old Sharp LCD projector.

 

[ScottR]

Sound of Music is $8.88 at Target if they are out of Kicking and Screaming.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Good grief, I swung by 3 stores to see what was left over, and spent another $200 (mainly as backup gifts, the leftovers will be returned later):

Circuit City:
They brought new stuff that wasn't in the $5 bin yesterday, and I wound up buying 18 DVDs.

Best Buy:
The Shield Season 2
The Shield Season 3
Arrested Development Season 1
Dave Chappelle Season 2

Target:
Family Guy vol. 3
LOTR: TTT
The Interpreter

 

[EricSchulz]

Let me clarify:
Target, as a rule, does not usually offer substitutes on out-of-stock CDs or DVDs, just rainchecks. Some stores MAY have done this because of the traffic on Black Friday (we did not), and the substitutes are chosen by the store that is out-of-stock, not corporate. So, YMMV...

 

[EricSchulz]

As a retail employee for 20 of the past 24 years, this had me ROTFLMAO!!!! Let's face it, Black Friday is almost what I consider an "urban legend". It is NOT the biggest shopping day of the year, and generally has not been since I have been in retail...the Saturday before Christmas is. There is a perception (almost like mass hysteria IMHO) that everything is such a great deal that it creates this out-of control shopping spree. Here is an EXCELLENT example. When Madagascar came out less than two weeks ago, we (Target) had it on sale for $14.99. My store sold about 250-300 copies in its first week (Tues-Sat) of release. On Black Friday, we had it advertised for $14.88...and for the mathematically challenged, that's ELEVEN CENTS LESS. We sold between 300-400 copies IN LESS THAN EIGHT HOURS. Black Friday is like Sweetest Day...it is a marketing device that everyone thinks has more meaning than it actually does because we are TOLD it does.

 

[Jimi C]

To add to Erics story.. I work at Walgreens, whom for some reason actually participates in the black Friday madness despite the fact that there primary source of profit is the pharmacy. Well, anyway, we had portable DVD players advertised for $79.99 after rebate. At 7am when the doors opened there was 1 woman who came running in and immediatly asked for one. That was the only one we sold. We had 60 in stock, and they will forever sit in our back room untill 2 years from now when we mark them 75% off and throw them in the clearence section.

 

[Ravi K]

We HTFers know that, but people who don't constantly track DVD prices don't. Its easy for us to spot the deals while ignoring the "deals," which, on feature films, pretty much have to be around the cost of a rental for me to take advantage. The real deals are on TV sets IMO.

 

[Patrick Sun]

This is why I rarely spend more than $9 on a DVD (more around the $4-$6 range for single DVDs as gifts, or for the personal collection if possible) or try to keep it $25 or lower on a TV box set during these BF sales. By the time Christmas shows up, it's nice to give out $40-$50 TV box sets that only cost me $15-$25 each (of course, the recipients are in a rude awakening if they try to return them for store credit...)

 

[Chris Lockwood]

These sales have gotten totally out of hand. Why do stores have to open at 5 or 6 am? Why can't they open at their normal time & have the sale start then? It's ridiculous to expect people to get up in the middle of the night to go shopping.

Everyone else I've asked about this seems to agree with me, so I think stores are turning off a lot of shoppers. I was so disgusted that I didn't do any shopping the entire long weekend.

 

[Mitch Stevens]

If it were true that opening stores at 5 am are turning off a lot of shoppers, then there wouldn't be lines, a mile-long just to get into these stores.

I think a lot of people enjoy getting their shopping done as early as possible so that they can have the rest of the day to enjoy the things that they bought.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Well, if the crowds in the stores were any indication at the ones I shopped at on Friday morning, there are many, many people who didn't mind the early start times enough to stay in and protest the start times. Some people are hardcore bargain shoppers, and some aren't. I look at it as more time for the stores to make money on Black Friday with longer store hours to kick off the shopping frenzy that the holidays bring.

It could be worse, it could be like CompUSA, they opened their stores at midnight after Thursday turned into Friday, and stayed opened for 24 straight hours.

 

[Jason Harbaugh]

At least BB was nice enough to start some exclusive sales starting at 5PM on friday such as the $10 gift card for every $100 you spend.