Brad

With GottaDEAL in its 20th year, it is time for some long-overdue changes to the site and these changes will be taking place relatively soon (i.e. in the next few weeks if all goes well). Since I'm posting this on the forum, let's talk about that first. I will be upgrading the forum software to the latest version. The version we are currently is pretty close to a decade old I believe. We're going to be doing some testing this week to see how smoothly the upgrade will go and if all goes well you will be seeing a brand new forum very shortly. We have a very big database so the conversion could be tricky but fingers crossed everything goes well. To go along with this, the current forum app that some of you use is being deprecated. The new forum software has a much more capable mobile version (with newer features such as web notifications) so you really won't be missing much not having the app anymore and there is big upcoming software update for the forum that will make the mobile experience even better. And then the main GottaDEAL site is also getting a refresh. With Black Friday becoming less and less significant each year, I've combined the current main site and the Black Friday site into one single site. That took a lot of back-end changes over the last few months. Rest assured we'll still be posting the ads and there will be a Black Friday page that has all the updates like the current Black Friday home page - most of the changes are behind the scenes to make things easier for us. The new version of the site will also finally be mobile-friendly - something that should have been done years ago to be honest. I kept the overall design pretty close to what we have now because it's what we've had in various formats for the entire 20 years the site has been around and it works well. The new site structure will allow for new features in the coming years as well. So that's about it. I'll try to give as much notice as possible when I have to shut things down for the move/upgrade/conversion but if you visit the site or forum and things look different or the site is down, this is likely the reason.

Happy "Halfway to Black Friday" Day!

https://corporate.bestbuy.com/my-best-buy-memberships/ Sadly you may now have to pay $50/year if you want early access to their BF sales.

Scans: https://blackfriday.gottadeal.com/Catalogs/HallmarkOrnaments Also available in PDF and on browse-able product pages on https://www.hallmark.com

Down to 48 members

3 prize club members in danger of dropping out....

Lost 6 members in January so we're down to 56 members.

Party City files for bankruptcy https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/18/business/party-city-bankruptcy

Some good/bad Best Buy news this morning: Thank you for being a My Best Buy member. A couple of changes are coming to the program that we'd like to let you know about. Shipping change: Starting now, as a My Best Buy member you'll get free shipping on all BestBuy.com orders, with no minimum purchase required. You'll also continue to have access to exclusive member offers, order tracking and your saved purchase history. Reward points change: The second change is that on February 14, 2023, earning points on eligible Best Buy purchases will become an exclusive benefit of the My Best Buy Credit Card.

Also if someone wants to start a new never-ending BF story thread, feel free

Looking like we could lose several more retailers this year. Bed Bath & Beyond getting close to bankruptcy https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/06/business/bed-bath-beyond-coupon-future/index.html Party City nears bankruptcy https://www.dallasnews.com/business/retail/2023/01/06/party-city-nears-bankruptcy-as-it-runs-through-cash/ Macy's closing a few more stores https://www.axios.com/2023/01/05/macys-store-closing-list-2023

Only 320 days to go lol Not much anticipation for BF these days but here is the thread.

Thanks to Bopeep for doing this yet again. Closing these threads now.

Down to 62 members. The script I run says these members dropped out: dropped out: aprncess dropped out: biomajor dropped out: bpr dropped out: christinajoy7 dropped out: dgiesb21 dropped out: gr8girls dropped out: Iliveforblckfri dropped out: Midnight55 dropped out: mjbateman dropped out: MuffinGA dropped out: redraccoon dropped out: sas377 dropped out: Sim31 dropped out: smurfgirl dropped out: starbeck96 dropped out: Stowasser dropped out: Suzy Crampton dropped out: tanner08 If you're on that list and did post during December, send me a PM so I can look into it and fix any errors.

Merry Christmas

10 days left in December and 26 members are in danger of dropping out...

Add me to the list after Kanyon

And the winner (chosen at random via random.org) is... drum-roll please... Bopeep The randomly selected winning post was this one in one of the many contest threads we had this year. Bopeep had 70 entries in the contest. There were 1,807 total valid entries for the contest this year (basically all non-deleted posts in this forum except for my posts and posts in the 2 prize club threads). Congrats and Bopeep please check your PMs to claim your prize. If the prize is not claimed by January 31, 2023 it will be forfeited.

Last day to get your entries!

Forgot to post this on the 1st but we closed November at 80 members which I believe is our largest first month total ever. I'm going to put the over/under for members at the end of the year at 50 lol. Good luck to everyone. 42 of you already have posted for December.

sale starts in 15 minutes

Preview the sale: https://www.walmart.com/shop/deals/cyber-monday

2022 ads have been added to the Black Friday Archive: https://www.blackfridayarchive.com We're now at 1,300 total historical Black Friday ads over 19 years

76 members right now. Last year we had 71 to start. 4+ days to sign up.

These were posted yesterday but they didn't go live until today.