What Does The FL Think of So-called Black Friday?

[gear-guy]

Getting ready to smoke turkey breast for Thanksgiving so before I start would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy it how ever that you choose to celebrate!

 

[PHIL1959]

I can never understand those that queue for hours to buy cheap tat, but hey that's me.

 

[Zemke Fan]

What Does The FL Think of So-called Black Friday?

Put simply... "It isn't amused."

 

[flat-top]

I'm a store manager and have to be at work at 7:30pm tonight (Thanksgiving night). "Black Friday" has now officially taken over Thanksgiving itself. If there isn't a major backlash, it will just keep getting earlier and earlier for us retail folk. We are now down to only 2 holidays off a year.

 

[Doctor Strange]

It's utterly disgraceful, but as I often say:

You can't tell me anything that will further lower my opinion of the American public.

 

[sheeplady]

Interestingly, surveys have found that most of the people out there on Black Friday aren't buying gifts at all. They're buying crap for themselves. 'Tis the Season.

Exactly. There are better sales other times of the year.

Has anyone found a good list of the stores that are choosing to open on thanksgiving and those that are not? I would like to avoid shopping at stores that are opening early forever if I can.

I know that Michael's Arts and Crafts, Sears, JC Penny, Target, Walmart, and Kmart is opening Thanksgiving day.

Jo-Ann Fabrics and Lowes are choosing to remain closed for the holiday.

 

[sheeplady]

I'm a store manager and have to be at work at 7:30pm tonight (Thanksgiving night). "Black Friday" has now officially taken over Thanksgiving itself. If there isn't a major backlash, it will just keep getting earlier and earlier for us retail folk. We are now down to only 2 holidays off a year.

I find this really disgusting. Are you getting time and a half, or just being made to work? I was talking to a Walmart employee and he was saying he needed to come in at 4 and he wasn't getting any extra pay. It was come in or lose his job. (Not that getting time and a half means anything, but at least it is better than a regular wage. Still would be better if they were closed. Some types of jobs you need to work on holiday, retail is not one of those.)

What a wonderful way to spend a holiday.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Here in Maine our last remaining Blue Law prohibits large retail stores from being open at any time on Thanksgiving Day. They'll be opening at the crack of midnight tomorrow though.

It's time for retail workers to organize and put a stop to this crap. A nationwide Black Friday sit-down strike or two would put the fear of God in the corporations, but nothing else will.

The theatre is open tonight because the film distributors require it, but I work the whole show myself unless one of the kids wants to volunteer to come in to sell the popcorn. I won't *require* anyone to work a holiday.

When I'm dictator, the Blue Laws will be coming back.

 

[flat-top]

I find this really disgusting. Are you getting time and a half, or just being made to work? I was talking to a Walmart employee and he was saying he needed to come in at 4 and he wasn't getting any extra pay. It was come in or lose his job. (Not that getting time and a half means anything, but at least it is better than a regular wage. Still would be better if they were closed. Some types of jobs you need to work on holiday, retail is not one of those.)

What a wonderful way to spend a holiday.

It's actually the worse case scenario for me...I'm a salaried employee so by, say midnight tonight I will be working for free.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

It's not something that particularly bothers me. People will always be attracted by discounts, and shops need to shift stock. Seems pretty silly to get involved in the scrum though. Same goes for the release of the newest gadgets which always seem to attract such mania.

It is the ultimate end of consumer capitalism. You can't have our system without it running to this situation. The purpose of the system is to get as much of your earnings back into the hands of the major capital-holders as quickly as you can spend it. It's my view that it's our responsibility - as rational human beings who understand the system - to resist consumption as much as possible in order to better our lives by building our own capital. The degree of hair shirt will vary from person to person but I suspect the general FLounger is just as consumerist as the general populace.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

This is what happens in the absence of a unionised workforce and a neutered Federal and State workplace regulatory system. Not a political statement, just a point of fact.

was talking to a Walmart employee and he was saying he needed to come in at 4 and he wasn't getting any extra pay. It was come in or lose his job. (Not that getting time and a half means anything, but at least it is better than a regular wage. Still would be better if they were closed.

 

[Sharpsburg]

There is no product on the face of the earth that would entice me into stores on Thanksgiving OR the Friday after.

Sadly, the market will decide if stores remain open on Thanksgiving or not. Lots of people may SAY they won't shop that day, but we'll see who does show up. Those of us who do care about the issue must vote with our pocketbooks - don't shop that day, shop local, or maybe don't shop at all. That way you maintain some kind of control over your shopping destiny, at least.

 

[Guttersnipe]

. . . It's my view that it's our responsibility - as rational human beings who understand the system - to resist consumption as much as possible in order to better our lives by building our own capital. The degree of hair shirt will vary from person to person but I suspect the general FLounger is just as consumerist as the general populace.

That's very well put, BK. I've often wondered how much consumerism / materialism is at play when talking about collecting vintage clothes, antiques, etc. For example, I wonder is lining up for the stamped into a big box retailer any different than doing the same for an estate sale?

 

[LizzieMaine]

This man is a *real* man, a man of courage, a man of convictions, and a man with real red blood in his veins. More people need to be like him. Thousands more. Millions more. Otherwise, nothing will ever change.

"I accept that the refusal to comply with this greedy, immoral request means the end of my tenure with this company. I hope you realize that it is the people at the bottom of the totem pole that make your life possible."

It occured to me while looking over the ad flyers in today's paper -- what if there was a *consumer strike?* What if thousands of people who think "Black Friday" is an abomination just happened to show up at the stores tomorrow morning, and piled inside -- and then just roamed around *refusing to buy anything,* and taking up space that would otherwise be occupied by manic shoppers. What if thousands of people just decided to throw a big fat monkey-wrench into the whole machinery of Capitalism's Most Sacred Day? What if that idea spread like a virus across the Internet and thousands, millions of people just brought the whole mess to a grinding halt?

Just an idea.

 

[vintageTink]

Exactly. There are better sales other times of the year.

Has anyone found a good list of the stores that are choosing to open on thanksgiving and those that are not? I would like to avoid shopping at stores that are opening early forever if I can.

I know that Michael's Arts and Crafts, Sears, JC Penny, Target, Walmart, and Kmart is opening Thanksgiving day.

Jo-Ann Fabrics and Lowes are choosing to remain closed for the holiday.

Hobby Lobby is closed tomorrow, as is the mom & pop fabric store I go to in Bakersfield. They both open at 8:00 am on Friday, normal operating hours.

I also do not shop at Joann's without a coupon.
I try to find a lot of my fabrics at thrift stores if I can; sheets will make more than one piece of clothing depending on what I'm making.

 

[Flat Foot Floey]

LizzieMaine, I am afraid this would be even more stressful for the people who work in retail. Imagine if the shoppers try to fight the protesters. Ugh. But maybe it could work if the people call it a "flash mob" and film each other. Other forms of protest are not cool anymore I guess. The hippies spoiled it all.

 

[LizzieMaine]

LizzieMaine, I am afraid this would be even more stressful for the people who work in retail. Imagine if the shoppers try to fight the protesters. Ugh. But maybe it could work if the people call it a "flash mob" and film each other. Other forms of protest are not cool anymore I guess. The hippies spoiled it all.

Yeah, that's what's so depressing. We, as a nation, have forgotten how to really fight back -- we're so afraid of getting our hands dirty that we just bow our heads and bend our knees and take what we're dished out.

In 1936-37 there were over 1700 sit-down strikes in the United States. And only 25 of them were broken by management, the police, or the Army. The rest of those people stood together no matter what, fighting and bleeding until they won their victories. That's what it takes, and that's what we no longer have the guts, as a nation, to do. I hope things are different in Europe.

 

[AtomicEraTom]

I worked in retail when I was in High School. It's no fun on that end of it, either!

 

[Guttersnipe]

Sheeplady and others who oppose people working on a holiday, let me run some terms by you -- firefighters, hospitals, gas stations, steel mills, military, police/prisons, shipping, airports/aircraft, financial markets and the entire rest of the world which doesn't recognize our holiday but we do business with.
Would you have all of that shut down too or is it just retail stores you object to??

Ah, the old Straw Man logical fallacy. Please explain how you equate the jobs of vital public safety and transportation workers with those of retail workers?

 

[Fastuni]

Sheeplady and others who oppose people working on a holiday, let me run some terms by you -- firefighters, hospitals, gas stations, steel mills, military, police/prisons, shipping, airports/aircraft, financial markets and the entire rest of the world which doesn't recognize our holiday but we do business with.
Would you have all of that shut down too or is it just retail stores you object to??

Put more straw into it.
As you mentioned the "rest of the world"... here it is still perfectly normal that shops and factories are closed on sunday and all holidays.
Does not prevent firefighters, policemen, hospitals inter alia from doing their job. German economy also has not suffered because of these workfree days.
Why "steel mills" and "financial markets" working on holidays are equivalent to vital services of public safety and transportation begs for explanation (in addition to what Guttersnipe mentioned). [huh]