Black Friday

I really marvel at the stupidity of the average American who buys into this nonsense and ventures out — even as I am typing this at 4 a.m. on “Black Friday” — with the belief they are going to get some miraculous deal.

The truth is very few people actually get anything any less expensive and do indeed get the cheapest junk retailers can find to pawn on this infamous day. A good deal of the bargain junk will be lucky to make it beyond the following year.

I quickly read through the page on Wikipedia regarding this and share some of it with you:

The term “Black Friday” originated in Philadelphia in reference to the heavy traffic on that day. More recently, merchants and the media have used it instead to refer to the beginning of the period in which retailers go from being in the red (i.e., posting a loss on the books) to being in the black (i.e., turning a profit).

The news media frequently refers to Black Friday as the busiest retail shopping day of the year, but this is not always accurate.

While it has been one of the busiest days in terms of customer traffic, in terms of actual sales volume, from 1993 through 2001 Black Friday was usually the fifth to tenth busiest day.

In 2002 and 2004, however, Black Friday ranked second place, and in 2003 and 2005, Black Friday actually did reach first place.

The busiest retail shopping day of the year in the United States (in terms of both sales and customer traffic) usually has been the Saturday before Christmas.

In many cities it is not uncommon to see shoppers lined up for hours before stores with big sales open. Once inside the stores, shoppers often rush and grab, as many stores have only a few of the big-draw items.

On occasion, injuries and even fatalities are reported. On Friday, November 28^th, 2008, Jdimytai Damour, a worker at a Wal-Mart in Valley Stream, New York was trampled to death by shoppers who broke through the store’s glass doors minutes before the store’s scheduled opening at 5:00 a.m.; a pregnant mother was hospitalized from injuries in the same human “stampede”, though early reports of a resultant miscarriage were determined to be in error.

On that same day, 2 people in Palm Desert, CA, were shot and killed in a Toys R Us store during an argument.

You probably also are wise enough to realize the other story, the one about this being the “first day of profit” for the year is totally a ridiculous lie to cover up the real meaning of the designation.

Isn’t it amazing how people can convince themselves they should go shopping in the middle of the night in search of some elusive “sale” or great “deal” - and actually risk life, limb and sanity doing so?

I hope any of you reading this are smart enough to know better - and if not - I hope you survived another year in the battle zone of “Black Friday” without mishap.

Update: 5:45 a.m.

I took Tracey to work this morning - otherwise I would have no reason to be on the road at 5 a.m.

I decided to go get some breakfast at the Shake A Snake in Pekin and I was astonished at the traffic on Court St.

It gets better. I drove past Staples and Menard’s on my way home. There were at least 30 people in line at Staples and well over a hundred at Menard’s.

I could also see the parking lot at Wal-mart was loaded too. I couldn’t see if there was a line at Wal-mart but I doubt it since they are open 24/7 but I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t close and re-open at some ridiculous hour just for the tradition of “Black Friday”.

The thought occurred to me as I was driving by this line of people standing huddled in the cold with plumes of vapor wafting in the stiff breeze. Why?

I wonder how many of them would be willing to stand in the cold for at least a half hour (I assume this because they were out there at 5:35 a.m and I’m betting the doors didn’t open until 6 a.m.) if I offered them $20 to drive across town before the crack of dawn to stand in a line freezing their asses off?

I bet fewer than 1 in 10 would take the offer. And none of them would if they realized that not only would they not get $20 but would be spending a whole lot more than that to “save” even less.

I doubt if even 1 in 5 of those people actually spent $20 less than they would have during normal shopping hours. And if they did I suspect whatever “sale” item they bought was of inferior quality and won’t last the new year out. Absolutely crazy.

And yet hundreds of people in the Pekin area alone are just that stupid. I guess that explains why Duh-bya was in office for 8 years and why anybody would buy a book written by some unknown woman with Sarah Failin’s face on the cover.