A Mommy Story

I’ve always been a Black Friday shopper. Oh, I know, it’s a crazy pastime to fight crowds in the cold early morning hours, but I’ve enjoyed the sport of it. However, it’s been less and less fun over the past few years. For all that I like scoring good deals, I really haven’t liked how early stores have been opening, or how some of the crowd have become more fierce. Fist fights over a TV? Trampling each other to get in? That doesn’t sound like fun at all.

Midnight openings were about the limit of what I accepted in the past. Opening at 8pm on Thanksgiving day seems a little extreme. Or like yesterday, opening at 5pm on Thanksgiving day, Toys R Us? Oh no, that’s too early. I like to shop, but no way I’m cutting my family time short for some cheaper toys.

This year, seeing how early stores were opening, I decided I wasn’t all that interested in being a part of the madness. Beyond that, we also haven’t felt the need to buy as much this year. So this time, I used the online Black Friday sites to look through the scanned ads, made note of the deals we wanted to take advantage of, and which ones would be offered online. I wanted to try to find as much as possible online.

I stayed up late Wednesday night, and when midnight came, I checked out Lowe’s website and bought my first Black Friday deal. With free shipping to the store, it cost the same as it would have waiting in line. Easy.

Thursday morning, while the kids were taking baths, I took a peek at Target’s website. All of the sale items I wanted there were available, so I added them to my cart and checked out while still in my PJs. I was already halfway done with my Black Friday shopping, before Thanksgiving had really even started, and without standing in a single line.

Thursday evening, my mom kept the kids overnight for us. She had originally offered so that we could go out shopping. But when we arrived home after Thanksgiving dinner, we realized we didn’t need to go out shopping. We looked at Best Buy’s website and found the Nintendo 3DS (that Cordy had been wanting) at the best price yet, so we bought it with free shipping.

With no need to go out to the stores that evening, Aaron and I took advantage of the time by going to the movie theater to see The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. (Good movie, by the way.)

There was only one item we wanted that would require a trip out to the stores. We’ve been wanting to replace our older Christmas tree, since it looks a little sparse and half of the pre-lit branches are no longer lit. We saw a great deal at Home Depot, but we knew it would go quickly. Aaron and I decided to go for it, waking up at 4am Friday morning to be in line at Home Depot for their 5am opening.

Of all of the lines I’ve ever stood in for Black Friday, the Home Depot line was the best ever. The store manager was outside chatting with the crowd, and one of his associates was walking up and down the line, offering free donuts and coffee to everyone. It was bitterly cold, so the manager quickly produced hand warmers for the early morning shoppers as well. Even Santa came out to greet the crowd, wearing a Home Depot apron and handing out store maps for the sale items.

Santa was dressed for comfort with sneakers, too.

I’ve never seen such an amazingly friendly staff for an event like this. It made being up that early not nearly as painful as it could have been. At 5am sharp, they opened the doors and welcomed us inside. I quickly had the tree (got the next to last one – whew!), checked out, and was home and back in bed by 5:30am. I stood in line for a total of 20 minutes before the store opened.

So simple.

We’re done with our shopping now, and managed to avoid most of the craziness involved. (And the little bit of craziness we did participate in, we were rewarded with coffee and donuts!)

I think I may do as much online Black Friday shopping as possible now. It was painless, it let me enjoy Thanksgiving with my family, and I didn’t have to spend the whole night out in the cold. I also used my Ebates account to get cash back on each online purchase, so really, I saved even more than those who did brave the crowds.

I like the idea of starting a new family tradition of shopping online for the items we really want and then catching a movie, leaving the lines and crowds for everyone else.