cllehto

I think a lot of items on sale Black Friday were cheaper with coupons available before Black Friday.

Daughters and I left home around 4:35 to go to JCPenny for the coupons and snow globes. Maybe 50 in line at 4:50 when we arrived. Got the coupons and snow globes and headed to Kohls. Let the daughters out by the entrance and parked the car. They got coupons but they were out after I parked the car. It was around 5:30. Target was on the way and had a line past several stores at that time and their parking lot was busy. We shopped for sweaters and checked out. Not really busy- checkout line only had a few people in it. Headed back to JCPenny to use the coupons. JCPenny had stopped handing out coupons but were handing out snow globes-there were still a hundred or more left. We shopped and paid for the items. The line was long but about a quarter of what a normal Black Friday would have had. Next stop Lowe's for poinsettias. There were not many cars in the parking lot at around 7 am. They had racks and racks of the 2 for $12 poinsettias by the door outside and in the isle when you walked in. We looked around the area with the flowers and could not find the 2 for $3 ones. I asked a salesperson and was directed towards the end farthest away from the garden area. We didn't find them in the area we had been directed to but went a few rows further and found 2 people passing them out - there were still hundreds left. We selected ours and checked out. On to McDonald's for breakfast. Took a break to relax and then took one daughter to the airport for her return flight home. Returned to JCPenny a few minutes before the 1 o'clock giveaway. There were maybe 20 people in line for the giveaway. It was in the middle of the store so you had to hunt for it...or ask someone. The coupons at that giveaway were for next week. We left. Returned at 4:55 for the "golden shopping bag" giveaway. We were 2nd in line. We shopped for gifts for a few friends. When we checked out there was one person in front of us. Around 6pm we headed for Bath and Body Works. It was packed. Much busier than the stores we shopped earlier.

Congratulations! I went and got a snow globe and $10 off$10 coupon.....then back at 1 and got $10 off $10 to be used Next week.....then the golden shopping bag with 10% off from now until Dec 24th- used it already. lol I don't think they had as many people show up as expected because they had a lot of snow globes left to give out when we went back after going to Kohl's. They had stopped giving out coupon cards by then. Also they had a lot of "golden shopping bags" after a while too. The morning line was maybe 50 people when we got there 10 minutes before they let people in (used to be hundreds). At 1 there were about 20 people in line- they had the line in the middle of the store instead of by the door so we had to ask where they were giving out the stuff. At 5 there were maybe 10 people in line when it started. Not the excitement of the old Black Fridays. After the first coupon giveaway I went to Kohl's and got $5 off coupon-or should I say my daughter did-they ran out while I parked the car.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I agree that sometimes it's not worth the hassle to save a few bucks and it's less stressful to have it and not worrying about getting one.

It's online on the gottadeal site.

I found a remote controlled robot that I think my grandson will like.

The one near us had really good deals on Black Friday. But as someone mentioned Parking is terrible!

Lucky!

I'm still hoping for the 99 cent poinsettias. The also had small Christmas trees for half price. They make good gifts.

With all the online Black Friday sales already going on, it seems like Black Friday already-only without the waiting in line in the cold. But, some of the earlier deals were better than some of the current deals.

I don't have to work. Honestly, I haven't seen ads for anything that I really want to get up early for. I'll still go out but no "must haves" this year.

I agree. I spend less too. Plus I've found some good coupons on Amazon before Black Friday so the things I want are cheaper. Other things I miss the sale and decide I don't want. lol

I'm waiting for the Home Depot poinsettias too. The Aldi's by me only had $5.99 ones.

I agree that the old Black Friday is gone. Even Kohl's didn't have as long a line last year.

Time with you if you live nearby. Take them out to dinner or a local Christmas event.

I found some nice Christmas cactuses at Aldi's. They weren't on sale but weren't really expensive either. Still want the poinsettias from Home Depot. Last year we also go a few small Christmas trees and gave them away to people who would not have a Christmas tree otherwise.

Id go with a Samsung. I've had good luck with them and we don't have cable so Samsung + gives us a lot more channels than just over the air TV.

They might but I'm sure other stores would hear about their sale and put the stuff on sale early to take the business away from them. That's sort of what it seems like they're doing now with all the early sales.

Our paper doesn't have many ads any more. I like having paper copies of the ads.

I noticed that too. Also note that some items were on sale at the same price before but also had a coupon which made them even less. I noticed that last year and look for the coupon deals early this year. I've noticed also that the night before a gold box deal some of the items were cheaper and sometimes had coupons.

Can't wait for an actual ad

I agree that too many things are excluded from the coupons. I guess I haven't gotten their new credit card. Must be trying to get you to use it other places or something. I have found some of the items I could only find at Kohl's on Amazon at a much lower price. They seem to be the same quality . I try not to go to Kohl's near opening on Black Friday because the lines were super long the few times I went. I prefer to shop online for Kohl's and have stuff shipped to out of state relatives. That usually works...but one year they shipped the stuff to me even though I put a different address and said they couldn't change it even though I called as soon as I got the email confirmation and the shipping address had been changed to mine. Now I'm hesitant to order stuff for another address.

I'll go out on Black Friday even if I have nothing in mind to shop for. I'm not sure if shopping online saves money or costs money. If you are looking for just one big deal and check out quickly there isn't as much impulse buying. But if you are just checking out all the many sales and find one or two things you want it adds up...and it's easier to use a credit card than cash-if that's how you pay -and it's easy to spend more.

Yeah. I think when the kids were old enough to go they were as excited about Black Friday as I was. We would look through all the ads that came in the Thanksgiving Day paper after lunch and plan out strategy for Black Friday. We took the ads with similar door busters and ones for stores we knew we would go to with us to look for different stores if we didn't get the door buster of choice. We scored a laptop one year by going to a store with fewer popular deals that opened an hour later than our choice. Fun times.