Black Friday Lessons

So, I historically have never really been a big fan of Black Friday. Growing up, my family usually went Wednesday before Thanksgiving to avoid all of the insanity. But, since getting married, William really does like to go out and do shopping on that day. It usually is later on in the day so its busy, but not insane. Since we were out at Saratoga Springs, we decided that we would go at 5 am to get some of the deals since the Walmart was brand new and we thought that since it is still an up and coming area. Boy, were we SHOCKED by what we saw. The parking lot was already completely packed by the time we got there and they had roped off major sections of the store for the lines for the big deal items like the $200 laptops. They had special sales completely lining the aisles and that combined with all of the carts and everything- it was a madhouse. I felt like people were just grabbing everything and filling up their carts. We got some of the good deals that we had wanted but the worst part was the checkout lines. We each stood in 3 separate lines and it took us AN HOUR to check out. This is the view of the line- yes, it was that bad. And yes, pretty much everyone (except us) had carts OVERFLOWING with stuff. We will NEVER AGAIN go to Walmart early morning for Black Friday. Its just not worth the time, pain, and suffering to get a few "deals".

However, we will go back to places like Best Buy (good deals and lighter lines still were had) and Bed, Bath, and Beyond (20% off entire purchase coupon). And even going out later on in the day isn't bad and we were able to get a good amount of our Christmas shopping done :-) So we'll still probably participate in Black Friday just not at Walmart :-)

So, we didn't buy this as I do not need yet another stuffed animal but we thought it was just so clever- I especially like Darth Vader with the light saber