[pablo-me]

Last year, I crawled out in the wee pre-dawn hours to compete with fellow Omahamen for the covetted Black Friday sales and found I was out classed by the true die hard shoppers. People literally camped out to have first crack at Play Stations, laptops and 'once in a millenium' deals.

Tempuratures will be frigid tomorrow morning. I'm just going to drive around this year and check out the mayhem as a spectator, but would like to hear firsthand accounts (good or bad) from this years shopping athletes.
Happy Thanksgiving To All!

[pablo-me]

WOW!!! CHECK OUT THE ADS IN THE OMAHA WORLD SPECIAL THANKSGIVING EDITION.

Noticeably gone were CompUSA and Toy-R-Us!

BIGGER SURPRISE!!!
NO deals like last year. No door busting deals at Best BUY, or any of the high tech stores. Nebraska Furniture Mart had only one real price savings on a clearenced laptop for $249.
Everything else is saving so minimal, it's not worth the extra time to stand in line.
I think the big bussinesss' in Omaha figured it out. They can skip a year or two of deals and the sheeple will still show up because there are so few stores for too many people.

[pablo-me]

OK, JUST GOT BACK AND ALL I CAN SAY IS; "OH MY GOD"!!!!!!

The temperature on my thermometer was 9F at 6am this morning! So cold, I decided to dress like I was going skiing. I let the car warm up and thought I'd give NFM a try first. They were clearancing a laptop for $250. It was the only real deal for this great shopping day. It was a good laptop and NFM had 200 of them. I thought: "It's so freaking cold, no one could survive long waiting in line!" "I might have a shot!"

Of course, 78th from I80 to Dodge was bumper to bumper, but this year only in the left hand lane. An ominous sign. Then I saw why as I got to within a few blocks!!!

Cars running lights, making illegal turns and plainly disregarding public safety to manuever for themselves. People were literally dashing across Dodge in between moving cars. Horns blared constantly in the pre-dawn pandamonium as this event was decaying into 'Gladiator Meets The Titantic'.

As I walked the two blocks to the store, panicked price-hunters zipped around me like they were fleeing a burning building. When I turned the corner and saw the line, I knew I wouldn't be getting any special deals. It was 4-6 people wide and literally circled the electronics store, which takes up a whole city block. My estimate was +2,000 people, to squeeze through only two sets of doors.

Knowing there'd be nothing left, and there wasn't any real savings anyway, I decided to walk the perimeter and get a feel for the mood of the people.

They were quiet and cold for the most part. I was impressed how stoic they were, especially those near the front who were close to full blown exposure. NFM had rent-a-cops with bullhorns and they broke the crisp air with orders "THE LINE STARTS AT THE OTHE SIDE OF THE STORE! ANYONE TRYING TO CUT IN WILL NOT BE ALLOWED INTO THE STORE!"
There was the obligatory 20 year old kid smoking a cigerette and dropping the F-Bomb for all fellow patrons to be impressed by.
The Barney-Patrol continued to blare orders through their horns and I asked one of them how fast the good stuff would last...he laughed and said; "If it's on the fromt page of the ad, it'll all be gone within minutes". He looked at the line of wide eyed hopeful shoppers and shook his head knowing that most would walk away with empty arms, if not empty pocket books.

I stood back as they opened the doors and a great shout went up from crowd.
I think I heard them cry out; "All hail to Mrs B., Savior of our Mediocracy!"
I snapped some pictures and left, glad I was not so dedicated.

I next went to Ace Hardware to pick up some fuses, and as I walked in, the girl handed me a really nice $20 hand saw. Huh,...that's how you get people to buy. Make em feel like you're glad to see them, instead of treating the like cattle (aka NFM).

I've seen Black Fridays All over th US in the past 25 years. This is the first time I went to mostly watch the people. There certainly wasn't anything special about the sales. I wonder if it's like this all over?

[ralleia]

The last time I participated in Black Friday was 2002. That year Best Buy, CompUSA and a number of other stores had some really attractive items.

This year the ads were positively boring. Nary an item to tempt me to crawl out of bed and drive many miles to stand in the frigid morning. I did notice that Best Buy said that they would be handing out coupons for certain deals starting at 3 a.m.!!!

Thanks for the spectator details though!