Marcster

Amazon runs a "Deal of the Day" every so often on unlocked phones... ASUS, Sony, etc. Just keep checking their page: https://www.amazon.com/gp/goldbox

I have a CVS that is literally within walking distance of my house (it's like 3 blocks away), so I go there on Thanksgiving. I also shop on Amazon on Thanksgiving. But that's about it... I'm certainly not going to camp out on Turkey Day, I'll leave that to the die-hards...

I'll only go with a pre-paid plan from here on out... We were with T-Mobile for a short while (their coverage was awful). But to add insult to injury, their database of users was hacked so our credit report was compromised. Hello cc-monitoring service. Thanks for nothing, T-mo! We're with Cricket Wireless now, which is the pre-paid arm of AT&T. Love the coverage!

Amazon, naturally... Then it's CVS on Thanksgiving (I can walk to mine) and Lowe's on BF. I pick up about 24 of those $.88 poinsettias that they have every year to decorate the dealership where I work.

It really seems to me that even more deals are available for a longer period of time. Like Len alluded to, perhaps it's because of excess inventories that need to be depleted. It seems that some of these companies are trying to create a Black Friday Week and a Cyber Monday Week... How long till the consumers become overwhelmed by having too many deal e-mails and pages of specials to look through? I know that I never made it through all of the Newegg offers because there were just too many and the real deals didn't jump out at me compared to the so-so specials (but perhaps that's the point).

BJ's & Lowes will be my only two stops this year. How crazy is that?

More here: http://cleveland.cbslocal.com/2013/11/21/campers-already-staking-out-black-friday-bargains/ Who has this kind of free time? And it isn't that warm in Ohio this time of year...

I remember some camera at Office Depot way back when... It was a 5 MP Panasonic point & shoot if that gives you any idea how long ago I am talking about... Well, I didn't camp out and they said that all of them had been given out. I picked up some other stuff that was on my list and got in line. The woman ahead of me had one of the cameras but was frustrated because she thought it was even cheaper (I think she was confusing it with another camera in the ad). Anyway, she told them to just keep it, she didn't want it at that price. "Uhmm, yeah, if she's not buying that one, I will."

They haven't listed the DVDs yet... But they will at least a week before the sale starts.

Often times the item that "never arrived" was already bought up by the employees before the store opened for Black Friday. "Never arrived" is a response that generates less anger from the customers they have to explain it to.

That's quite a window!

It'll be Cyber-tastic!

Amazon -- DVDs: Amityville Horror, Battle: Los Angeles, Matrix (Blu-Ray), Iron Man (Blu-Ray). Newegg -- Adobe Lightroom 4 (photo editing software) (it was the deal of the day yesterday) and a 27" LED Acer Monitor. CVS -- a few of the freebie deals. Lowes -- 26 of the $.99 poinsettias to decorate the dealership, plus one for my wife's desk at work, and one of those $9.98 tool sets and a 15' utility hose that I needed anyway (it wasn't on sale). Pep Boys -- 2 of the $8 after rebate Penzoil oil & filter deals and a pair of Rain-X Latitude wiper blades w/$10 MIR. Ebay -- while the rest of America was watching football on Thanksgiving, I snagged two vintage lenses for my Sony DSLR for about 1/3 off what they usually sell for on Ebay. I love auctions that close on Friday & Saturday nights for the same reason -- but holidays are the best for snagging a good deal.

I am not surprised that they aren't offering it around BF. I signed up for Prime last BF to be able to order the DVD specials without having to meet the $25 minimum order requirement for free shipping. I kept it after the monthly trial. I'll be renewing again this year... Without the streaming movies and TVs I'd really feel like I was paying for free shipping, but that does help to justify it in my mind. I do find that I order a lot of things on Amazon that I never did before. Amazon does have some amazing prices on auto parts (who would've thought?) and I get some obscure house-related things (such as a brush for the dryer vent), and they had a good deal on cologne that I ordered last December. These are things that I probably wouldn't have even thought of ordering on Amazon if I didn't have Prime.

I see that "Unknown" is $1.99. I bought that from their DVD sale on 11/25/11 for the same price. Sort of odd to see the same movie from year to year, maybe they didn't sell them all last year? It's a good thriller, if anyone is looking for one.

The cell phone store inside Sam's Club sublet their space from Sam's Club. You do not need a membership to Sam's to buy a cell phone from them -- just tell the person at the door that you are there to look at cell phones. Also, the pharmacies at the Sam's Clubs do not require membership (just that not every Sam's has a pharmacy).

Reading, PA

We have a CVS about three blocks away... It's a definite stop for us (usually on Thanksgiving).

We bought the upgrade before this past one at Radio Shack on Black Friday. They had special pricing, whooped the pants off of AT&T corporate store pricing. We actually bought later in the day, they weren't the hot ticket on BF.

McDonald's has their Monopoly game going on once again... Here are some SINGLE-USE (per person) codes: CODEFORMORE FREECODEMCR GOPLAYATMCD GOFREEFORME GOFORITCODE GOFORPRIZES MCDMONOPOLY REFRESHCODE WINANEWFIAT Of course, there's nothing stopping you from creating multiple accounts for every member of your family and using each of the codes for each one of them... http://www.playatmcd.com

I bought our Kindle Fire through a deal with Amazon Local where you could get a free coupon for $30 off a refurbished Fire (making my final cost $139). You could keep your eyes peeled for something like that... Amazon Local has done some similar coupons for the basic Kindles too (always on refurbs). I would guess they do deals like that to keep the stockpiles of refurbs from getting too deep.

I would like to affirm that I am not pregnant.

Jimmy -- welcome to the forum! I'm thinking there might be a tiny lingo issue between UK English and USA English. But we refer to supermarkets as large stores they sell groceries (milk, eggs, produce, etc.) "Big box stores" are the places such as Walmart, Best Buy, HH Gregg, and the like. Yes, those places use a ticketing system. Yes, you certainly have to get in line incredibly early. Best Buy is the most heavily trafficked on Black Friday it seems and people will start camping out in line on Tuesday or Wednesday for the best deals. Other places that sell laptops, such as Staples, OfficeMax and Office Depot won't require overnight camping stays; maybe just arriving an hour or two in advance of the opening, but it'll depend on the geographical market (I think the more obscure physical locations are less busy). Be sure to check out our forum, we'll get you up to speed.

I can attest that the grocery bags (in the swag photo above) are quite nice. They're really big with a flat reinforced panel on the bottom and have held up to weekly grocery store runs.

They aren't closing the stores -- Penney's sold off the clearance portion of their business to an capital group. No clearance stores were closed and no employees lost their jobs. Here's an article about it: http://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/news/2011/10/18/jc-penney-sells-15-outlet-stores.html My wife and I frequent the Reading, PA store. They can't be beat for bedding or men's semi-casual shirts (stuff to wear with khakis).