The Curious Case of Black Friday

Here's to hoping that everyone had a happy Thanksgiving. And if you didn't celebrate Thanksgiving, here's to hoping that you had a happy Thursday.

I've long been fascinated by this whole Black Friday dealio. You know what it is. It's the thing where businesses have great deals on select items and those deals either start on or are only good on the Friday after Thanksgiving. The thing that they don't tell you is that most of the time, the item that you want will likely be in the quanitity of ONE at the store that you're going to. I'm not so sure the purpose of that strategy. I guess it's to hope that you buy a bunch of other crap while you're there, but does that really happen? I mean, if I'm lined up outside of somewhere all night long (and I would be, mind you, I'm just saying) and I get inside (and don't get trampled in the process) and some old biddy manages to swipe the last one out of my hands my knocking me in the kneecaps with her cane, I don't know that I'm going to be doing any more shopping at that moment. Actually, in that particular scenario, I don't know if I'm going to be doing much more walking either, but I really don't know about doing any more shopping. I think I'd probably be going home and going back to bed.

Seriously, how good are the deals? I've scoped out the flyers and I have found very few items that would actually be worth considering standing in line for. Not for sure worth standing IN the line, but worth considering it, for sure. Best Buy has a Nikon Coolpix camera for $180 down from $300. That's a pretty good deal. I think Wal-Mart had a $32" LCD TV for $258 or something like that. That's a smokin' deal. Are they both in-line-all-night-smokin'-deals? Ehhh.

Now, Best Buy opens at 5am. Wal-Mart was already open on Thanksgiving, so I don't know how that's going to work. Toys R Us opens at midnight. Seriously, who are you people who wait in line all night long to get these things? Is it really that good of a deal? I've looked at the prices for hundreds of items and I can only cite TWO that MIGHT be worth a trip to the store an hour before it opens. Standing in line all night? Unless they're giving out money, I don't think so.

I might swing by my local Best Buy and my local Target and Toys R Us and see what the line situation is. Mind you, I just inhaled a pile of turkey (I tend to write these things the night before) and that tryptophan is kicking in and I'm a little tired. If I can muster up enough interest to get up and go for a little drive, I'll take a few pictures and post them upon return. (Who am I kidding? I'll get 'em up when I'm up tomorrow.) I'm interested in what sort of people are hanging out at what sort of stores all night long. Now, I'm guessing they're the kind of people that I don't want anywhere near me, which is why I'm thankful that my camera has an 18x zoom lens in it. But I'm also guessing that they're the kind of people that I'm going to be really curious about.

If you end up participating in an all night sit-in-line fest, I'd love to hear about it. And if I'm missing out on some great deal somewhere, I'd love to hear about that too. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go try to sneak another hunk of turkey before they start serving pie. Mmmm....pie.

moreless