• • Kero's Complete Guide to Black Friday • •

Black Friday
A Shopper's Guide to the Madness
by KerokeroCola




What is Black Friday?

Black Friday (sometimes called Green Friday because of the association with money) starts the morning after Thanksgiving. It is often regarded as the start of the Christmas shopping season; indeed, many shoppers use Black Friday to get a head start on gifts. During Black Friday, major retailers generally reduce prices on popular items up to 70%. You can find video games for $30; you can find 40" HDTVs for $300; you can buy a new laptop for $200. The shopping list is endless, but so are the lines!

Unfortunately, many people sleep through Black Friday because they don't realize it even exists. Others show up but are mowed down by the crowd and end up with nothing.

This guide is to help you prepare for this wonderful morning and save you hundreds of dollars this holiday season. Enjoy!


Doorbusters



Doorbusters are items that are on sale very early in Black Friday. Generally sold between 5 AM and 10 AM, these are the gold mine items for the Black Friday shopper. These are the 70% off items, and these are the ones you need to look for. Select items are set aside as "doorbusters" by stores, and it's your job to decide which ones BEFORE you show up, if you want to actually walk away with some goods worth $1000 that you bought for $300. Planning and execution here are key.




Black Friday List

As I just said, it is crucial to plan ahead on Black Friday. In the past, Doorbusters were secret, and the hellhole that ensued at 5:00:01 AM was horrible.
Thankfully, we have Al Gore's wonderful Internet on the customers' side....



BlackFriday.info
This website is GOLDEN.

The following is a screenshot of the stores that have their doorbuster sales "leaked"....



As I'm sure you can see, there is a gold mine of information available on this website. USE THIS! Pick your favorite retail store, and browse through their lists. Check out another retail store; they might have something better. Check out a third to see who has the best deals. Make a list of what you want, but remember your odds of successfully going to two stores is pretty low, so keep it to one store.



How To Buy

Buying crap on Black Friday isn't just like going to the store on any old day. There will be at least 1,000,000,000 (yes that's one million) people in every store, no joke. And every single one of these people wants the same item you do. Come armed to the teeth, and expect a blood bath.




First rule of thumb: Come early. This means wake up early. Stores open at 5, but people line up way before that. Last year, I had my eye on a nice HP laptop for $200 and a PS3 bundle with 2 games and 1 blu-ray movie for $250 from Wal-Mart. They were sold out of both by 5:02 AM. So get there early.




Second rule of thumb: Bring a buddy. If you want a 40" TV for $300 and a TV stand for $60, chances are you can't get both in time because they're both too bulky for one cart. Bring a friend to come with you (and offer to buy him lunch the next day for his trouble) and tag-team both locations with separate carts.

Heck, even bring a third friend to hold your place in the check-out line. However, if you manage to make it here, you're probably safe. 99% of the problems are getting the item in your cart.




Third rule of thumb: Be ruthless! Everyone else is going to be clawing their way to savings, so why should you not be? Just be as polite as possible. ^_^





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Now I'm scared... I really want a netbook but that picture looks haunting.

"There will be at least 1,000,000,000 (yes that's one million)" -lold

Nice guide, very appropriate.

 

Thanks, Pkpkpk. Maybe 1,000,000,000 is an exaggeration, but still

It's all VERY worth it. $150 for a brand new netbook? I'll swim to China and back for those prices. Besides, it's kinda fun to be in the fray.

 

Lol, I've always done Black Friday but never thought of bringing a buddy with me or a third one to hold the line for me.

Will do that this time, great guide and thanks!

 

I believe he was referring that 1,000,000,000 is not one million dollars...haha.

Anyway, nice guide. I think i'm going the night before to get ready!

 

You're camping outside of the store a whole night before? Wow, that's dedication!

Thanks! :love:

I always bribe my younger brother to stand in line I can usually hit two stores that way.

 

I really like this guide Kero! To start of I think that you have chosen a great topic to write a guide on. Along with that I think that the picture look good as well, and fit in well with the guide. The guide can also give the people reading a sort of "heads-up" on what they have to expect when they actually get to the stores.

I also liked the fact that you put in little tips around the guide that the buyers could use. Also the affects you used on the text (colors/boldness) looks pretty nice, but maybe you could just add a little more color? I think that when writing guides there is a happy medium with the effects you use. If you are going to go ahead and use them then use them well, but don't overdo it.

Now for the things that I think that you could to do improve the guide. For one I think that you could maybe add a little more detail to some of the subjects you wrote on. I think that you might have done well on some part, and then slacked off a little on the others. Also another thing I would like to bring to attention is that completely centering your guides can actually hurt your eyes to read, and personally I don't really like it when guides are completely centered.

I hope that this helps!

 

I wanted to know what Black Friday is (I live in Italy) and WOW it is EPIC I will go to America one day during Black Friday

PS 1,000,000,000 is not one million it is one billion One million is 1,000,000

 

haha nice guide. ive done black friday a few times and its usually fun cuz its so crazy haha