anyone actually went out and beat the crowd? i forgot today was the whole black friday thing...tried to go to to comissary for a cake and then i saw the crowd and i said...forget this.. turned and left the damn place... lol... i heard a lot of crazy stories from co workers how packed everywhere is compared to last year.... not worth it... glad i did online shopping...

 

I was just telling my friend that it wasn't anywhere near as bad as last year, probably because of the economy.

I got to Pearlridge around 11:00 AM, found parking in about 5 minutes. Inside the mall was kind of nuts, but not overwhelmingly so. I made it to Ala Moana at around 3:00 PM, found parking right outside Macy's in a couple of minutes. My wife said that Ala Moana looked like any busy Saturday, didn't seem to be extra crowded, the retailers must be worried.

The only place that was really bad was Waikele, and that's because of poor design - traffic circulation is horrible, it's the worst mall design that I've ever seen.

 

I would think the state of the economy would have made BF even worse than usual

 

You guys probably heard how a 34 year old employee at a walmart in new york was trampled to death upon opening the store. There was also someone shot to death in a toys r us in california.

Just shows how this phenomena can sometimes bring the worst out of some people.

 

^^^Yeah that's messed up...you stay classy new york!

 

I remember passing by a long checkout stand line to order for food. While moving to stand in line at the Times Supermarket on S King Street, all the old ladies started bickering and yelling at me saying the "lines is behind us and not to cut" thinking I was cutting in line.

I yelled out "RELAX!!",....I normally wouldnt yell at anyone and dont how this reflex yell came about,...but it quited everyone down when they realized I was just ordering food and not checking out. or cutting in front of them..

Looked and sounded cruel then,...but I kinda laugh at it now,....

 

I tried one year. Never even bought anything. Just camped out with a friend at BB who wanted a laptop. From like 6 on thursday and he never even get a voucher for any type of laptop. Since that year I said the hell with this. I'll probably never do it again.

 

This year was not definitely like last year. The advertised items were not to compelling, especially for what I was looking for. I don't know about you folks, but I'm greedy that way for Black Friday items, I'm usually looking for something that I would like. Hell, I can do my shopping for others at another time, if I have to get up that early to stand in line, you can bet it's for something that I want. I left my home at about 3:30 to go for some stuff at Sears, and my wife wanted to check out Disneystore. She changed her mind about Ala Moana and decided to go to Windward Mall instead. There was a line, but is was for a chance to win a Wii and some Windward Mall gift certificates. We stood in that line for over an hour, but my actual shopping time at Sears was less than fifteen minutes. Looked for what I wanted, found, and went and paid for it. The electronics line was long for checkout, but the tools and automotive line was non-existent.

 

On Friday, I had to work at Ala Moana Center around 5a.m.. Even though it wasn't as busy like last year, but there were still afew stores that had 80 - 100+ people lined out side of them. Software Ect, Apple, Ritz Camera, Macy's, just to name afew.

 

When I worked retail I would LOVE to work Black Friday because I would sell like $5k to $10K and I was on commission.

One year, I made $300 in commission in one day plus my hourly which was like $7. In college, that was pretty good money.


But Black Friday doesn't even compare to when I was a night manager for a hotel company that owned 2 hotels across the street from each other...on New Year's Eve. Frickin' had to keep running back and forth between the hotels to throw people out, walk in on a room full of hookers, open the door to people smoking out (with haze bursting out the door) and break up at least 8 fights over hookers or ******...etc. That was a fun night. It took me 2 days to write all the incident reports and we had to go to court over a few of the rooms getting ultra-trashed / calling in cleaning companies to handle the used condoms and sexed on sheets.

 

i live on teh mainland now

and you are right

wards is bad