What Were the Stores Like Where You Were Shopping?

[bfaddict1977]

I don't think I've ever seen a thread about how the stores were on bf. I know they're crowded, obviously, but it seems some stores are managed better and easier to navigate then Walmart. I went to Walmart and Toys R Us last night and as usual Walmart stunk where I live. No organization. Not ONE person who worked there knew where the items were I wanted(they were kid items not electronics). The lines to check out were ridiculous. People were line cutting. No one was supervising. It was a mad house. I went to toys r us. Asked for help with the item I wanted. THey were WONDERFUL and I checked out within 2 mins literally. No line at all. our toys r us is always organized. Thankfully. What was everyone else's experiences this year?

[pogiporkchop]

My Walmart was the same chaotic mess but I was checked out in less than two minutes thanks to a very nice lady in cosmetics (and the fact I had two items, neither of which were electronics). This was about 7:30; I was there at 6 but couldn't even get a parking spot!

 

Bless that lady this season....

[Jen08]

Walmart was chaotic when I got there at 6pm. BUT when I got to target and the mall around 2am it was dead. Even the mall didn't get crazy busy until around 11:00am when I was leaving.

[Brad]

I went to Target around 9:30 last night. Not much more crowded than it would be on a typical weekend. I figured I should have an actual in-store BF experience for once considering I run this site   But then again all I bought was some groceries, so it was not a real BF shopping experience anyway, haha.

 

Went to Costco today around 11. Parking lot was pretty crowded but no lines at all at the registers.

[bamamomma]

We went to our local mall this morning around 5:30. The mall was practically empty except Starbucks and Belk's in the shoe department. It was really kinda odd. People were pleasant and friendly. We stayed until around 10:30 and then headed to Best Buy. Parked 2 stalls from the front. Wasn't any busier than a typical weekend really. Really kinda shocked at it all.

[smga1]

Toys r us was empty. Walmart was crowded. The mall was very busy. 

[NicM987]

My Wal-Mart did a great job this year! There wasn't any crazy chaos, surprisingly.

 

I arrived at Wal-Mart around 4:45pm. They started letting people take items (obviously not the bigger items) around 5pm. It was actually really nice to be able to load up your cart with stuff without having to wait for the sale to start at 6pm. I walked around and grabbed what I needed (home items, a few toys, kids clothes, DVD's, etc) and then joined the checkout line. They started checking out at 6pm and I was checked out by 6:30pm.

 

They had only 1 of the 50" 1-hour guarantee TV'S in stock (odd). But they had tons of those cards to order it online and receive by Christmas. They handed it out to everyone in the line and then handed out the extras to anyone who walked up and asked for one. People seemed pretty happy about that. I ended up picking one up too (couldn't beat the price).

 

I also went to Kohl's - good experience. I did go late though so I'm sure that helped. Walked in around 10:30pm. Still had a lot of stuff left and the line was long but organized. By the time I was ready to checkout (about midnight), there was no line.

 

Other than that, I shopped online. But I had great in store experiences this year too!

[charlatte99]

My daughter and I didn't head out until shortly after 7 this morning.   We didn't even attempt Target/Wal-Mart/ToysRUs - nothing we really needed there.  We went to the mall and were shocked at how empty it was.   I have never had such an easy trip into/out of Bath and Body Works on Black Friday.    When we went to American Eagle the gal said that they had been dead pretty much the entire time they had been there (since Thanksgiving night) and that the H&M store had sent half of their staff home at some point.

 

Things had started to pick up when we left the mall - probably around 1?    Old Navy was one of our last stops and checkout there was the typical Black Friday madness.

 

I really wonder if stores will rethink opening on Thanksgiving -although I think it helps those of us who don't go out until Friday morning b/c I think the Thanksgiving night shoppers were home and back in bed

[hack2222]

Charlatte99 I'd have to disgree that thanksgiving night shoppers were at home, I for one wasn't, I considered camping out in a snow storm for a tv @ bestbuy decided to just online shop, so I stayed warm stayed up till 8 am crashed hit the stores about 6pm till 2am woke up at 4am went to a 6 am opening and got home bout 4pm.  Still finding deals that I knew would be there like $0.69 cent Pepsi 2 Liters @ CVS.  After hitting some stores that launched their deals early like microcenter started about the 17th till the 30th crazy deals to be had, if it wasn't for all the rebate offers.  I'm not done shopping yet,

 

www.Dailysteals.com/rush has a chance for 22 people to win the opportunity to purchase an IPad MINI 3 for $88, granted it's a lottery but we need tons of more people like 22,000.  Biggest experiment yet to date for a crazy deal and brand new IPAD Mini at that.

 

Dailysteals is looking for 44444 different players for a random lottery rush, <<<<< Addicting crazy deals whenever a rush is going.  Destroying Black Friday Prices and everything to make a Christmas at dailysteals..  When the player amounts have been reached the lottery begins and goes until all the amount of winners are claimed this one has 22, after 10 mins we go to round 2 until all are claimed.  Yes it's a legimate offer GoPro, Sony PS4, Xbox one all have been offers so far, gotta be in it to win it, make sure u click to join and make an account and GL with the latest addicting deal game.

 

The biggest problem is that walmart for example put everything into the first two stages so by 8pm everyones gone at 10pm, while that may be great for those that don't work, I'd like to see it be more balanced, and take some of the items and push them to 6am Friday.  Stages only work for big ticKet items, but even then why stop the customer and trap them in there for a 4 hour block, I'd want to flip the merchandise as quickly as I could, they think that stages will keep u in the stores, not if all you want is one item.

 

To bad the hoodie I ordered from represent didn't show up, I wore a coat to cover up my gottadeal tshirt from last year, what a crazy 3 day period with snow storm freezing temps, and perfect thanksgiving evening a little cold but not bad don't think I took the doorbusters home this year just the entire door all in shreds.  The only problem I had with stores was too many good deals, some cashiers went the extra mile and then some to help with coupons and making sure that if they had a store card you got the offer for whatever, even had one as the sale was going off saved me a mail in order rebate and just gave me the product for the ticket price, the key is organization to start with maps and a flow of traffic and then it's Game on, I bounced thru most of the major box stores within few hours started at kohls, hit bestbuy, walmart, target, Macy's and ending the first wave with Old Navy, morning kick off with walgreens, then hit a store that I don't shop often and used the map and was out within an hour and onto the rest of thruout the day, hitting malls and just searching for those hidden gems of doorbusters that scream buy me, I'm free or close enough, I love Black Friday for the hidden gems, the expected movie/ tv/ every year items are preferred online to make way for the enjoyment of Black Friday,

Edited November 29, 2014 by hack2222

[mommy2twingles]

Kudos to our Kohl's store.  We arrived about 25 minutes before opening and got in the line that was forming.  The store manager was coming down the line about 5 minutes latter handing out tickets for the TV that was on sale.  They then had several associates come down the line with their shopping bags offering them to anyone who needed.  Both the store manager and several mail employees stayed outside with us until opening to make sure that there were no line cutters as we all entered the store.  Once we got in again everything was orderly, many associates floating on the sales floor to make sure they could answer questions and two employees at each register, one to ring and one to bag.  Made a very nice shopping experience.

 

Walmart was horrible, more the set up and blocked isles everywhere than anything else.

 

All in all the lines everywhere were much smaller than past years.  One thing overall that I do not care for are the stores that open on Thursday to close at 1 or 2 am and reopen at 5-6.  Either open on Thursday and stay open, or don't open till Friday.  If you have something I want I am going to come to your store no matter which day you open on, but it makes a long night for those who are out and having to nap in their car waiting since it is to far to go home and there is nothing open for 3-4 hours.  Our mall did this for the first time this year which is where we usually spend the early morning hours and it made for a very long night. 

[Kanyon71]

Only place that was really busy was HomeDepot, Kmart wasn't horrible busy but as always SLOW.

[Dlions720]

We got to best buy arond 15 minutes before they opened and only about 50 people ahead of us. We got everything we wanted. It was much slower than normal. It did pick up around the mall about 9pm. It was crazy busy this morning.

[tncplace]

My sil and I went to the Wal-mart by me first. I was determined to get the new skylanders figures and starter pack but no one in the store could tell me where they were. Finally found like four characters and one starter set for a different system (figured I could exchange it another day) picked up a few clothing items and then realized that the line was all the way in the back far corner. We decided that we had already wasted 45 mins and was not going to sit in thAt line. Headed to Target got a tv, the skylanders starter kit and 10 characters. The characters were a dollar more each but with the redcard discount and a coupon for 10 off if 100, they ended up cheaper than walmart and no lines whatsoever. I don't remember my walmart ever bring as crazy as last night and I have been doing bf shopping for a number of years. They had yellow tape cutting off aisles and honestly the selection on items was really lacking, I think I will start at target next year.

[fran]

The stores by me were great.  The longest line I was in was kohls and that was 10 min if that.

[gatorburg]

I been going to one walmart for 5 years now. It has gotten better every year. This year the registers was blocked off. They let you get the none big items at 3pm. To get the 1 hour items you had to get in a line for the ticket. Then get into a checkout to pay for the item. Then had to go get in a line to checkout all the other items. And they controlled what checkout line you took ur shopping cart too. The police was just hanging out doing nothing. 

[tinkrbel]

It was fairly quiet and very civilized. Parked pretty close to every store but maybe that's because we weren't there AT opening. We started at jcpenney for snowglobes at 545 then hit macys, best buy, target and 2 walmarts. Then BF morning got to tiger direct about 520 then headed biglots but wound up in Annas linens first because the security at big lots didn't open doors, walked to Joann fabric where time was lost because we ran into bff and helped her pick some stuff for my godsons birthday and then paid for some stuff to get max coupon use. Then off to home Depot, walmart, target and pep boys before rushing home to get to work for 10am.

[Bopeep]

The Walmart we went to was crowded, of course, but I was impressed with the way they managed the checkout lines.  They, too, had the area roped off so you had to get in line at designated spots, then employees directed you to registers as you got to the front of your line.  We were probably in line 15-20 minutes. I've seen much worse.  Target was next and I was amazed how quickly we checked out there. We had never gone to this particular Target (Moore, OK) on BF, usually we go to a bigger one in Norman, OK. I do believe we will go to the Moore store from now on.  Not very crowded. The movies and games were very organized. The only thing we wanted that we didn't get was the sleep tees, and they weren't gifts so no big deal.  Of course, we weren't after any major hot items. After that we went to Gordmans, and again found it to not be nearly as busy as years past. And as near as I could tell, they still had plenty of every doorbuster available. Their ad was not nearly as big as usual this year.

 

I think the craziest store we hit this year was Academy at 5:00 Friday morning. And even they weren't as bad as I've seen them in previous years.

[kjunea]

Walmart was horrible near me. Target was so organized, fantastic. The only other store I went to Thursday night was Bath and Body works and it was fine, no problems.

 

Friday morning, we went to Macys and it was crowded. They had a Santa roaming the store, talking to people, thanking them for coming to Macys, which I thought was nice. The cash register people where slow as molasses, but that was okay. Costco was crowded, crowded, but moved quickly.

[len_mullen]

I stopped into Wal-mart Thursday night and they were managing the number of people in the store and access to the door busters nicely.  Didn't buy anything.  I stopped into Staples around noon Saturday. They said they were not very busy at all at opening.  I didn't get anything there except for some stationary products not on sale.  Market Basket (local grocer), the Verizon Store, and the AT&T Store were all very busy.

 

Of course, a lot of us lost power Wednesday night, so that may have influenced spending/shopping priorities for BF.

[momlori]

Stopped into Lowe's and Home Depot and they both still had a few filibusters left around noon

[ytmomof4]

Walmart was definitely the busiest.They had everything out except the big ticket items you could just take but couldn't checkout until 6.

Went to toys r us at 730 am Friday not busy at all and neither was Walmart at about 8 am.

[connieh]

Walmart was controlled chaos.  Home Depot opened a little early which was nice.  Gander Mountain had no crowds.  Menards was jammed packed and had plenty doorbuster items on hand.  Fun times had by all.

[Lusha121]

Started with meijers on thanksgiving at midnight... we got everything we needed. went home, napped, had steaks instead of turkeys and got ready for the shopping rush. Hit the 6pm @ Walmart by us. It was crowded, but not the insanity that i have witnessed/been a part of in years past. I took my dd 14 and ds13 with me this year and they looked at me like i was crazy! I'd been telling them the horror stories from years past, how to stay safe, not to let go of me, no matter what!!! etc.... there was no need for all that. walked in at 5:40, found the infinity whatever game, grabbed that, some pj's, socks, video game stuff, jeans and were checking out by 6:10. no crazy lines, no fights, no nothing just a typical walmart in 'december'.  our best buy had a line, but nothing like in years past.  Kinda disappointed LOL! 

 

Went to dunhams (next to a target that looked pretty empty) couldnt find one stupid thing in the ad. UGH! went to our mall across the street... busy anchor stores had long checkouts, but no more so than usual. bath and body works was a 5 minute checkout. aero was less than that!  payless was empty, debs empty, hollister empty, gap empty..... i think the thanksgiving opening was a total loss for retailers! 

 

The busiest store was menards Friday morning. but in and out in less than an hour...with everything that we went in for (last year it was 3 hours just in the checkout line).  Sad shopping 'weekend'  it just didn't "feel right" this year. 

[Elmck]

Both Walmarts near me were horrible!! Aisles were blocked maps were not followed by the stores, employees were not imformed etc...

 

Pennys was great employees helpful lines moved quickly

 

Target employees knew where to direct you and even went with me to get one item, customers thoughtful and kind too. I embarrassed myself by falling in the store and I mean laid out face plant falling I think my shoe stopped and I didn't.. My son says he never thought he'd see me shop til I dropped!!

[Kim3498]

The Walmart I went to was total chaos. I had a lady try to grab a baby alive doll outta my hand, and then while trying to get to checkout with my hands full I caught a man trying to help himself to inside my purse. I went home after that. Next year I think I will just order everything, and forget going out all together. The tradition of Black Friday is ruined for me anyway, with these new hours.

[stacya]

Wal-Mart was complete chaos, but I managed to get my stuff and be out the door by 6:15.  Any place I went after that wasn't crowded at all, but in JCP, there were people trying to use multiple coupons for their purchases, so I waited probably 2-3 times as long to check out there than I did in Wal-Mart...ridiculous!!

The Walmart I went to was total chaos. I had a lady try to grab a baby alive doll outta my hand, and then while trying to get to checkout with my hands full I caught a man trying to help himself to inside my purse. I went home after that. Next year I think I will just order everything, and forget going out all together. The tradition of Black Friday is ruined for me anyway, with these new hours.

Holy crap!!

[brandibug]

We went to Walmart on Thanksgiving evening with no real expectations. We didn't even bother showing up until around 6:45 because we weren't interested in any of the big ticket early bird items. It was crowded, but not too chaotic. The stores itself was a mess from being rearranged so much to accompany everything that was going on. I second that not a single employee that we asked a question to knew the answer. I honestly don't even know why they were there because every time I asked a question I received a "I don't know, let me go ask" response. I was mostly asking questions to see if they knew the answers. We discovered tons of "sold out" items hiding in the clothing department, which is where the checkouts were being funneled through and I guess people were discarding stuff as they talked themselves out of it. So we almost had more fun digging through the discards than actually shopping. IT was pretty fun though - since we were mostly there to people watch and buy whatever we could we didn't have an issues.

[msomnipotent]

I had no plans to go out because I am just getting over a horrible cold, but found myself in desperate need of headphones that could only be found at the mall at 10pm on Thanksgiving. There were some people, but not much. I found myself at Farm and Fleet on Friday and people were going ape crazy over the half priced bird seed. I saw 4 full pallets disappear in less than 10 minutes. It was pretty crowded but everyone was well behaved except a woman that was trying her best to start a fight with me. Honestly, if she would have jumped in front of my cart and stopped just one more time, I would probably still be in jail. Costco seemed like a regular week day. Pep Boys was a real let down. I ordered a Razor pocket mod and a jump starter online Wednesday morning and never got a pick up notice and the order somehow disappeared from my account so I had to call the 1-800 number multiple times and kept getting hung up on. Finally got through and she said everything was fine but I would have to pick it up on BF, which I was trying to avoid. There were two registers open with only one person each in front of me, yet it still took 10 minutes just to get some help. Then they tell me that they are charging my credit card after I was 100% certain I chose the option to pay online. So I hold up the line calling Chase to make sure it wasn't charged yet, then the cashier holds up the line because their systems are down and they have to call every credit card order in over the phone. So what should have taken 5 mins took over half an hour. We get the stuff home and not only are both items obviously used, but the pocket mod is broken. At this point I just send my husband back to return them because I have had it. The employee gives him a "new" pocket mod that has a huge rip from one end of the box to the other and tries to hide it by only showing the good side and offering to carry it himself to the car. My husband just decided to take it because you could clearly see everything inside the box and the plastic didn't look damaged. All in all, never going there again.

[redraccoon]

For once the walmart I went to seemed to have a real game plan in place.  They were handing out maps at the door.  Staff seemed to actually know where items would be.  Items were spaced out in a manner you could get to them.....

 

Sure, it was kind of weird to have bikes in the milk 'n cheese area and kids toys in the produce department... but it worked.  By having runway lines well blocked off it kept the crowd in a somewhat orderly approach so there wasn't once mass free-for-all of flying elbows to get to the legos (or whatever)

 

They even had line marker people - employees with special vests and carrying a balloon who would announce every now and then that they were the end of the check out line so people would know where to get in line.  Every register was manned too!

 

Probably the best WM experience I've ever had for sales day

[chelamarc]

I was very discouraged by the chaos I experienced last year and I refused to go out early.  We actually did not leave the house until about 7:30, went to WM first and had an awesome experience.  I found everything that I needed...pj's, video games, board games and we were out the door by 8:10.  It was very weird b/c it was like a normal day at WM and the check out was fast.  Then headed to Target and it was pretty much the same.  Both places were very organized and the employees were very friendly and helpful.  Went home after that had dessert and watched movies and headed out again about 4:30, stopped at WM one more time and they had actually re-stocked many of their BF items....got some more pj's, rubber-maid containers, soccer balls, footballs and a few more video games... We hit the mall after that and it was quiet and we all got pretty much everything on our list.  I think that next year we will stick with this schedule b/c it worked so well for all of us!