Saturday, November 24, 2007
Black Friday....
We have a tradition in my family (much like eating at Waffle house on Christmas, but that's another blog) that the day after Thanksgiving we pick out a place and do the whole Black Friday early morning shopping thing. This has typically consisted of going to Staples at about 4:30 in the morning to get memory cards, hard drives, monitors...whatever kinda geeky stuff you can get cheap by being the 6th person in line.
We ramped up our efforts last year...we actually did a recon on the store the Wed night before Thanksgiving to find out where items would be placed on Friday. We hide some of the sale items in the store so that we'd be assured of getting at least that and we made maps of the store layout so that we could discuss strategy. I thought that was pretty hardcore....that was before this year....
This year we set our sites on Walmart. I had seen the ads in years before at Walmart, but never once tried to brave it. In fact, Walmart is right across from the Staples we go to in Guntersville, Alabama so I have seen the parking lot on black Friday and it was intimidating to say the least. By about 5am, you can't get a car into Walmart's parking lot, let alone get in the store. The whole "Open 24/7" think always sorta confused me as far as doing black Friday at Walmart goes, so I just stayed away, again....that was before this year....
The prize this year was a $388 HP laptop. The DV6000 is not the best laptop you can get, but it's down right decent for 388 dollars. The Laptop itself is about a 800 - 1000 machine and what walmart was selling was a bundle that came with a laptop case, sub woofer and speakers, wireless laser mouse, and remote control. We thought that made it a pretty good deal, but how to get one??
We were in the store around 10pm Thanksgiving night and chatted up an employee in the electronics section that told us that there were 5 laptops, two were HP's, the other three were Toshiba's. We went home for supplies (coffee, sugar, alcohol) and made the decision that we would go right back to Walmart and wait all night for these laptops. We were smart about it....we went right to the electronics section, grabbed up some chairs from the camping section and settled in to spend the night at Walmart. We were the only people there.
Us and the folks stocking the floor. Sometime before midnight, they came around and roped off the isles so that they could guard the morning blitz items. We were already in the electronics with no way in or out other than the main isle, so we got roped into this section. It was a long night....between about 1:30 and 3am there was a lull and my mother attempted a rollback of her own to get some sleep.
The rest of us just snacked and waited it out....
Starting around 3am people started showing up for the morning sale. They couldn't get over to our area so they lined up on the other side of the isle facing us....staring at us.....buggies in hand....just looking across that vast isle wondering WTF did those people do to get over there. By about 4am that line of people was 20 deep...just buggy, after buggy, after buggy....tired faces....angry mob. All the employees knew we were there for the laptops and they were trying to keep us informed. By about 4:45am none of the sale laptops could be found. I worked with your assistant manager Rachel who offered me some crappy walmart brand laptops as a substitute "see, it has an 80 gig hard drive..." she said. "And a Freakin' Intel Celeron!!!!! I want my dual core processor!!!!!" I replied. Next she offered a rain check for one laptop. "There are two of us buying laptops.....we've been here ALL night!!!!.....can you get a manager??" The manager came and offered to sell us a comparable Compaq machine that they found, but only one....cause the ad clearly stated that each store would have a minimum of ONE $388 dollar laptop. "But there are five!!!! We talked to a lady last night....she even knew what kind you had and how many of each.....We need TWO laptops to make this right". We agreed to buy the one laptop and the manager left. They rang it up...the angry mob was streaming....not only were we in the electronics section and they couldn't get to it, but it wasn't even 5am yet and they were ringing up our items.... Death threats could be heard from across the divide."YOU BETTER BE CAREFUL GOING TO YOUR CAR!!!" "WHY DO THEY JUST GET TO BUY ALL THE STUFF THEY WANT ALREADY?" Rachel shouted "THEY'VE BEEN HERE ALLL NIGHT" "WE'VE BEEN HERE ALL NIGHT TOO!!!!" (no...they had not...I would have seen them). Now it's just minutes to 5am and the angry blitz crowd is very agitated. From the back of the store I see the manager running towards us. "WE FOUND THE LAPTOP!!!! YOU CAN BUY THE LAPTOPS!!!!" They put them behind the counter.... "WHAT DO YOU NEED? YOU NEED TWO??? OKAY....THESE TWO ARE YOURS.." "RACHEL...THESE TWO BELONG TO THEM....YOU CAN'T RING THEM UP UNTIL 5AM.
We did the return on the Compaq and the 5am blitz started. I needed to buy a $398 Compaq desktop also and they were about 6 feet from where I was standing. My dad held my place in line and paid for his laptop as the blitz was announced. I ran the 6 feet and grabbed the Compaq and when I turned around there was a SEA of people between me and the register....already in 45 seconds there were over 100 people in line and my dad was stalling for time for me to get back with the PC. As I fought my way back to the register a 19" LCD television came flying over my head. I think someone was throwing it to a person in line. I don't know really....it could have been aimed at me. The crowd was screaming at us.... We got our items and we were leaving. Thank God we got lost in the crowd on the way out of the store, because I do believe someone might have tried to kill us....
We have a tradition in my family (much like eating at Waffle house on Christmas, but that's another blog) that the day after Thanksgiving we pick out a place and do the whole Black Friday early morning shopping thing. This has typically consisted of going to Staples at about 4:30 in the morning to get memory cards, hard drives, monitors...whatever kinda geeky stuff you can get cheap by being the 6th person in line.
We ramped up our efforts last year...we actually did a recon on the store the Wed night before Thanksgiving to find out where items would be placed on Friday. We hide some of the sale items in the store so that we'd be assured of getting at least that and we made maps of the store layout so that we could discuss strategy. I thought that was pretty hardcore....that was before this year....
This year we set our sites on Walmart. I had seen the ads in years before at Walmart, but never once tried to brave it. In fact, Walmart is right across from the Staples we go to in Guntersville, Alabama so I have seen the parking lot on black Friday and it was intimidating to say the least. By about 5am, you can't get a car into Walmart's parking lot, let alone get in the store. The whole "Open 24/7" think always sorta confused me as far as doing black Friday at Walmart goes, so I just stayed away, again....that was before this year....
The prize this year was a $388 HP laptop. The DV6000 is not the best laptop you can get, but it's down right decent for 388 dollars. The Laptop itself is about a 800 - 1000 machine and what walmart was selling was a bundle that came with a laptop case, sub woofer and speakers, wireless laser mouse, and remote control. We thought that made it a pretty good deal, but how to get one??
We were in the store around 10pm Thanksgiving night and chatted up an employee in the electronics section that told us that there were 5 laptops, two were HP's, the other three were Toshiba's. We went home for supplies (coffee, sugar, alcohol) and made the decision that we would go right back to Walmart and wait all night for these laptops. We were smart about it....we went right to the electronics section, grabbed up some chairs from the camping section and settled in to spend the night at Walmart. We were the only people there.
Us and the folks stocking the floor. Sometime before midnight, they came around and roped off the isles so that they could guard the morning blitz items. We were already in the electronics with no way in or out other than the main isle, so we got roped into this section. It was a long night....between about 1:30 and 3am there was a lull and my mother attempted a rollback of her own to get some sleep.
The rest of us just snacked and waited it out....
Starting around 3am people started showing up for the morning sale. They couldn't get over to our area so they lined up on the other side of the isle facing us....staring at us.....buggies in hand....just looking across that vast isle wondering WTF did those people do to get over there. By about 4am that line of people was 20 deep...just buggy, after buggy, after buggy....tired faces....angry mob. All the employees knew we were there for the laptops and they were trying to keep us informed. By about 4:45am none of the sale laptops could be found. I worked with your assistant manager Rachel who offered me some crappy walmart brand laptops as a substitute "see, it has an 80 gig hard drive..." she said. "And a Freakin' Intel Celeron!!!!! I want my dual core processor!!!!!" I replied. Next she offered a rain check for one laptop. "There are two of us buying laptops.....we've been here ALL night!!!!.....can you get a manager??" The manager came and offered to sell us a comparable Compaq machine that they found, but only one....cause the ad clearly stated that each store would have a minimum of ONE $388 dollar laptop. "But there are five!!!! We talked to a lady last night....she even knew what kind you had and how many of each.....We need TWO laptops to make this right". We agreed to buy the one laptop and the manager left. They rang it up...the angry mob was streaming....not only were we in the electronics section and they couldn't get to it, but it wasn't even 5am yet and they were ringing up our items.... Death threats could be heard from across the divide."YOU BETTER BE CAREFUL GOING TO YOUR CAR!!!" "WHY DO THEY JUST GET TO BUY ALL THE STUFF THEY WANT ALREADY?" Rachel shouted "THEY'VE BEEN HERE ALLL NIGHT" "WE'VE BEEN HERE ALL NIGHT TOO!!!!" (no...they had not...I would have seen them). Now it's just minutes to 5am and the angry blitz crowd is very agitated. From the back of the store I see the manager running towards us. "WE FOUND THE LAPTOP!!!! YOU CAN BUY THE LAPTOPS!!!!" They put them behind the counter.... "WHAT DO YOU NEED? YOU NEED TWO??? OKAY....THESE TWO ARE YOURS.." "RACHEL...THESE TWO BELONG TO THEM....YOU CAN'T RING THEM UP UNTIL 5AM.
We did the return on the Compaq and the 5am blitz started. I needed to buy a $398 Compaq desktop also and they were about 6 feet from where I was standing. My dad held my place in line and paid for his laptop as the blitz was announced. I ran the 6 feet and grabbed the Compaq and when I turned around there was a SEA of people between me and the register....already in 45 seconds there were over 100 people in line and my dad was stalling for time for me to get back with the PC. As I fought my way back to the register a 19" LCD television came flying over my head. I think someone was throwing it to a person in line. I don't know really....it could have been aimed at me. The crowd was screaming at us.... We got our items and we were leaving. Thank God we got lost in the crowd on the way out of the store, because I do believe someone might have tried to kill us....
