Black Friday – Ads, Lists, Inside Scoop, and My Wish List

Black Friday, the biggest sale day of the year is right around the corner!

 Are you ready?  

Are you going out early?

There’s been a lot of controversy about the time stores are opening.  I did an impromptu poll on facebook and the overwhelming majority thought stores should be closed on Thanksgiving.  I was struck by one comment though – someone was very glad that the stores were going to be open and they could work to earn extra money, badly needed this year particularly.  There are many families that periods of unemployment this year and even if they are working again, they are still trying to catch up.  I hadn’t thought about that.  With stores paying overtime or holiday pay, it is an opportunity.  It’s too bad we can’t go with the ideal solution, be open, but allow employees the choice of whether to work or not.  I’m afraid with the crowd size they probably need all-hands-on-deck.  Comment with your opinion or thoughts – open on Thanksgiving or closed?!

My mom and I usually go out at midnight or early morning.  We haven’t quite decided what we’re going to do this year.  I have some Amazon gift codes, so I may just shop online.  But I did go through the ads, “just in case”.  I do love going out on Black Friday – I think it’s fun and there is usually a spirit of camaraderie in the shoppers around here.  Of course, there are a few grumpy people, but generally, it’s been fun!  I remember the first year we went out at midnight instead of  early morning.  We were so naive!  We heard that the local mall was opening at midnight and we actually thought it would be fun to go in the stores when no one else was there.  *blush*  Seriously, we thought no one would show up.  Ha!  We got there at exactly midnight and there were no parking spaces left!  The entire huge mall parking lot was full.  We had to park across the street.  Some of the stores were so crowded that they exceeded the max number for fire safety and they had an employee at the door, only letting someone in when someone went out.  Well, now we know much better and check the ads, opening times, etc.  Now we are “professionals”  hehehe, not.

If you want a sneak peek at the ads and deals, there are two websites I recommend.  The first is slickdeals.net.  They are my all time favorite deal site.  But I do have to admit, the lists of the products in the ads, with pictures and links, is awesome at bfads.net.  Bfads.net has black friday ads for over 60 stores!  The lists are my favorite – easy to ready, quick to review.  Slick Deals has a nice round up of the best black friday deal at each of the major stores.

Both slickdeals.net and bfads.net have inside scoop on how the black friday events will run at different stores.  For example, Best Buy  uses a ticket system – going down the line and handing out tickets for the big items like televisions.  Walmart will have items on pallets, shrink-wrapped to restrict access until the starting time.  An employee will be stationed by each pallet to keep customers from cutting the shrink wrap and then the employee will cut it when it’s time.  For the extremely popular items on your list, you have to know information like this.  You can’t just show up and wander around (my preferred plan), the best deals on limited items will be gone.

Obviously, everyone will have a different shopping list, depending on who you are shopping for, but here are some examples of the bargains from my quick notes after scanning the ads.

• From what I read, Best Buy has the best deals so far in the race to attract BF customers.  There is a Sharp 42″ LCD TV for $199.99!
• Another hot, hot, hot deal is at Walmart -offering the XBox 360 4GB Console w/Kinect +$50 Walmart Gift Card for $199.96.
• Barnes & Noble is offering 50% off any one Educational Toy and Game.  If there’s a Leap Pad on your shopping list, people say this is the best deal that will be found, but it’s still debatable what will be “in-stock”.  Lego and Melissa-and-Doug are also great ideas for this promotion.
• HH Gregg has a refrigerator I would love to have!  A Whirlpool 25.1 CF Stainless Side-by-Side with filtered water and ice on the door.  The SRP is $1,299.99 and it’s going to be Black Friday priced at only $699!  It would look so nice in my kitchen :)
• Meijer has Princess Sparkle Dolls for only $5 and Lalaloopsy Dolls for $16.47!  There’s a Hello Kitty lighted make-up case that I know Rosie would love Santa to bring for $19.99.
• Target has a 12-cup Mr. Coffee for only $19 and Walmart has a Black and Decker 12-cup for only $9.44.  Target also has a $25 iTunes Gift Card for only $20 and the Headbanz game for only $10.
• Kohl’s has a great option on their site to go through the Black Friday ad and make a list that you can print out!  I have my eye on Barbie Dolls for $6.99; a Cuisinart 7-cup food processor for $69.99; a JLR Gear Marshmallow Raider for $9.99; Jumping Bean Bath Wraps for $7.99.
• Walmart has great prices and will match other ads!  I’ve been struggling with whether we need a new desktop or laptop and they have an HP Desktop for only $298 and a laptop for only $248!  They also have Barbie Dolls for $5 and Disney Princess Fashion Dolls for $5.
• To store all these crazy toys, Menards has cubby storage on sale :)  A 9 Cubby Storage Unit is only $25.96 and Lowes has storage totes for $5.48.