Black Friday, a rant

I just got back from the mad house. I have a whole lotta grrr going on.

Now, I love a good deal. And I am willing to do a bunch of work to get a good deal. I will glean someones fruit trees, I will weed a yard in trade for other things, I will do all kinds of things. But I hate wasting time. Truly hate wasting time.

This morning, I woke up early (way too early) to go to Old Navy to get a ski jacket for Bubble-butt. He's in Special Olympics, and they start skiing here pretty soon, so he needs a ski coat to wear up on the mountain. I can't afford expensive coats, so when I saw that ON had them on sale for $15, I was ready to jump all over that sale. Combined with fleece coats on sale for $5, which I could pick up for Skinny-boy (who tends to lose coats left and right), well, it was worth the trip and time.

The store opened at 3am. I'm nuts, but not that nuts. I got there at 3:45, picked up my four items, and got into line. So, here's my time-line, I am in the check out line before 4am. How long do you think it took me to get to the register?

Three hours!! It took three hours to get to the registers.

The question is: Why in the world would it take three hours to get to the registers? There are ten registers in the store. Of the ten registers, four of them were dedicated specifically for Old Navy credit card holders or for anyone who signed up for a credit card today. Six were for the rest of us who chose not to sign up for a credit card.

Seems ridiculous that on the BUSIEST shopping day of the year they would designate 40% of their check-out capacity for Old Navy credit card holders only.

Trying to "encourage" us to sign up for a credit card. And yes, it worked for several people.

I'm just annoyed at how manipulative it was. Because that's how I see it. Manipulative.

I don't mind the busy stores. It goes along with Black Friday. Suck it up, it goes with getting the deals. But the stores need to play fair too and not manipulate people who are in a hurry to get to the next deal.