Black Friday Debriefing Thread 2010

[EricKei]

I won't be partaking in the 5 AM insanity this year. I instead chose to use the money to buy brakes for my truck.

Same here! ... Except, I can't actually afford the brakes yet >_>

Public Works is closed today. However, the town will be be picking up both today's and Friday's trash tomorrow (regular time + holiday pay for a double day, hardly worth it; I understand they had trouble getting volunteers.).

A year or four ago, our town decided to dispense with that nonsense and save a little money -- if one of your Trash Days falls on a holiday, guess what? You only get one Trash Day that week instead of two. Avoids a lot of traffic snarls from all of the extra trash trucks that are (now) NOT on the road ^_^

As for BF workers:

May Retail Have Mercy Upon You All.

I did my time, for fifteen+ years, and I don't ever want to go back if I can help it...not that I have much of a choice, my slightly messed-up back prevents me from being able to stand upright for more than an hour or so x_x I'm in the office all by my lonesome today, situated where we are next to the busiest mall in the state. Traffic going home will be a real riot. Joy.

I still recall GameStore the year of Katrina/Halo...We reopened 3 days before the Halo launch, we literally had a line snaking across 3 of the store's four walls and out into the mall from 8am to midnight, every day, until the first week of January or so. You all have my profound condolences and empathy.

[eltf177]

A year or four ago, our town decided to dispense with that nonsense and save a little money -- if one of your Trash Days falls on a holiday, guess what? You only get one Trash Day that week instead of two. Avoids a lot of traffic snarls from all of the extra trash trucks that are (now) NOT on the road.

We would love to do that, but the EW's of our town would _never_ stand for that!

[DeltaSierra]

I've been hearing on the radio/news that stores are becrying the fact that people aren't spending "as much as they should/used to" on Black Friday and its bad news for the economy. Some stores are saying if sales don't pick up, they'll have to lay off people in the New Year.

Personally? I think the reason this is happening is NOT the economy but its the fault of the very same stores/businesses that are doing the complaining. They start bombarding us with Christmas stuff earlier and earlier in the year, and by the time the holiday DOES roll around, people are so fed up with it being shoved down their throats that they decide to just pack it all in and not buy gifts or they get gift cards instead so they don't have to deal with the crowds. They're also doing stuff like being open on Thanksgiving and other holidays and basically saying to the public "We don't care about the people who work for us or their/our families, the only thing that is important to us is your money, so you better come out and shop!" - that turns me off shopping completely.

[SeasonalSlave]

Just checking in to say I survived my first Black Friday as a retailer. And, strangely enough... It wasn't too bad for me, at least in terms of attitudes. Very, very busy and my feet are killing me and my throat's dry from all the talking, but... That's it. 97% of my customers were very nice and patient, which was impressive. I did hear about a few crazies in other parts of the store, though.

[Jay 2K Winger]

So, the shopping center was packed to the gills, to the surprise of absolutely no one. As I got out of my car at 6:30am, I noticed a crowd of people lined up in front of our store. "Well, shit," I say to myself.

The GM was doing a headcount as we opened the doors, and tried to keep up during the first 15min of the day.

Over 200 people in the first 15 minutes.

FML.

Still, the day went quickly because there were two FDLPs the entire time I was there. So we were keeping our shit together and getting shit done.

Just really crazy busy.

[ditchdj]

Would that idiot woman rather have all the retail workers quit their jobs and sit at home and use HER tax dollars to sit on their asses and collect welfare and food stamps???? Would THAT be better????

[bhskittykatt]

I don't do the whole Black Friday thing, but my friend was camped out at the Buy of Best at 7:45pm last night for a 5am opening to get a TV. She was about the 20th person in line. If you knew her, you'd understand she's normally that insane.

[crazyofficeclerk]

Black Friday wasn't too bad. I had problems with the CC machine and the Food Stamp machine. Matter of fact, somewhere floating in cyberspace is $35.08 which should be in our stores total. However, Tuesday and Wednesday were absolutely crazy in my store.

[sweetj82]

oh my my day was busy but ok.
Up until the end though. That is when i had a guy who bought a amex giftcard but did nt read it. wanted all his money back plus the fee. Oh my spineless manager gave him everything back...grrrr

[Android Kaeli]

It was an okay day, worse then last year actually. If two of my co-workers hadn't decided to muck up the break system, then it would've worked out a lot better.

For the last four years on Black Friday, I've been a floater -- someone who has a copy of the day's schedule in hand and tells people to go on break before jumping on that register. The bright idea of these two co-workers was to keep me on one register for two and a half hours, thus backing up not only breaks but the lines as well. Because people couldn't get to their breaks and/or lunches on time because I was stuck on one register, they had to tell customers to get out of their line so that they could, you know, go on break and/or lunch, thus pissing customers off as well.

Also, there was a 30% entire purchase [including sale items, excluding custom framing and floral, gift cards, prior purchases, and door busters] from 5 am to 12 pm. It was mad busy from 11 am to 1:30 pm, when I finally got my break, because everyone wanted to use that coupon before it expired. Even an hour and a half AFTER the 30% coupon expired, I had people complaining that they couldn't use it......even after the ASM said, no, you're an hour and a half too late.

Had a few people bitch at me that they couldn't get up at 8 am to use the coupon, then looked at me expectantly as though they were waiting for me to let them use the coupon. Hell no, sorry if I can get up well before the crack of dawn, then so could they.

[orcprincess]

I got reamed today because santa was embroidered on black socks and the snowmen were on the red socks???
Apparently, santa can only be associated with the color red. I apologized, and she told me I did not know anything about the spirit of Christmas, and this ruins her "special Christmas outfit" I'm pretty sure I'm not the only store in Denver that sells socks...seriously. Who really worries about this crap?....Oh wait...I forgot where I was...lol
She called the customer service line and demanded a gift card, and wanted to know who our buyers were!!! Geez.

[SourRobot]

I was really worried about Black Friday this year. Once again I had to open, so I had to be there by 3:45am. On the way to work I saw other stores and people were in long lines. It was ridiculous. Thank goodness there weren't long lines at my store.
It was pretty busy on and off, and customers of course would not read their coupons, so I had to explain over and over again why they weren't working. I was wide awake until about 7am and I crashed. I actually took a twenty minute break, which is pretty rare of me, but my legs began to hurt, which traveled up to my back and was causing a lot of pain. I had sort of planned on buying some gifts for my family after work because I saw some stuff I could get for my brothers and mom, but by the end of my shift (1:45), I was so sore that all I wanted to do was go home.
So that's how my day went. Now my feet are killing me and my back still hurts. I took a nap around 4:30 and got up at 6:30.
I don't know how other people manage to get Black Fridays off, because since being employed I've never had that day off. I guess I missed out on some good sales today.

[Food Lady]

I'm in the middle of it, on dinner break, eating PIE. I've been on the floor doing gobacks with no scanner, no walkie (all taken). Of course I'm having trouble locating anything, so I'm getting catbuttfaces. The thing I'm hating most is stuff on the floor. In every dept there is a large item taken off shelf and left on the floor for someone to run into. Why is this necessary? At least it's slowing down, now that we have our half million dollars in.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

One of the advantages of working in a grocery store is that Black Friday is one of our slowest days of the year.

I was originally scheduled 2:30-6:30 on front end register, but called called in around 8 because our new DSD girl was scheduled off today and of course, Snoopy didn't feel like trying to check in the vendors . . .

Worked fine for me though. Got the vendors checked in, made out my HBA order for Monday's truck and got most of my backstock minused off before Snoopy started checking his watch and whining about hours . . .

And no, I don't go shopping on Black Friday . . . I hate crowds and just don't see how it's worth all the hassle to risk physical harm just to save a little bit of money on stuff that I can probably get after the holidays at just a good a sale price if not better.

[XCashier]

As I predicted in my Fratching post, it went pretty much like last year. Fabric bolts piled up halfway to the ceiling and nobody available or able to put it away faster than it piled up (I did get a bunch of fabric put back, but it was like bailing out the Titanic with a teaspoon). Customers with heaping carts of fabric towering over their heads, wanting 5 yards each from twenty different bolts, then complaining about why it was taking so long. Line, line, everywhere a line, blocking up the aisles and breaking my mind...oops, sorry. But yeah, same , different year.