Each year David McCombs and a rotating crew of friends have shown up days – sometimes a week – in advance and set up tents, couches and folding chairs to wait for the official start of the holiday shopping season.
They played lacrosse, organized basketball tournaments and watched movies that they projected onto the side of the building. At night, they slept in sleeping bags and hammocks as they prepared for the year’s biggest competition: Beating their neighbours to discounted doorbusters.
Shoppers, it seems, are over the frenzied, harried, wait-all-night-in-the-cold madness of Black Friday. Consumers are increasingly shunning the shopping holiday, opting instead to spread out purchases over a course of weeks or months.
Before Black Friday became just another day of discounts, it was the largest shopping day of the year. For decades, customers lined up at the country’s shopping malls and big-box stores clamouring for deals they couldn’t get the other 364 days of the year. It was a frenetic hunt – that sometimes led to mass hysteria – for discounts. There were stampedes in stores and arguments in the aisles.
Here are 8 hacks to ensure that you have the best Black Friday ever:
1. Sign up for emails
Decide which stores you will shop at this year. Visit each website and sign up for email newsletters. It is important that you do this at least two weeks before Black Friday.
2. Shop on Wednesday
Sometimes, the Black Friday prices are not always the lowest price. Visit the store on Wednesday to find out.
3. Know where to shop
There are deals happening everywhere. Ensure that you know which stores will offer you the best prices.
The Twittersphere has suggestions too:
4. Money saved is money earned
Tips for this #BlackFriday
1. Money saved is Money Earned
2. If you really want to buy something then search for those deals and buy through an affiliate
3. Buying through someone’s link won’t increase your cost but will help the other person.
4. Karma is RealRT if you agree!
— Amit Bhawani (@amitbhawani) November 24, 2017
5. Charge your phone battery before you hit the shops
#BlackFriday is responsible for my dead battery and it ain’t even started properly yet 🤦♀️ #Emails
— L I S S E Y 🌻 (@crystal_tips) November 23, 2017
6. Check expiry dates!
#BlackFriday tips
Please be careful today.
Check your wallets.
Expiry dates.
Don’t over spend.
Use a list.
Only buy what you need.— Mr Twittar (@EraBaloyi) November 24, 2017
7. MYTH: You can’t beat Black Friday prices
According to Capitec, this assumption is false. Christmas is around the corner and retailers have a month left to lure consumers into their shops with attractive deals. On Black Friday, stores have so-called doorbusters – those are the big discount deals being advertised to get you into the shop – but the discount on the majority of the products is much smaller.
More importantly:
Some deals are too good to be true in the holiday shopping season. Here are some tips to protect yourself this #BlackFriday. pic.twitter.com/sFv4w6y6xW
— Eric Schneiderman (@AGSchneiderman) November 22, 2017
#BlackFriday updates in South Africa:
This is how you end up with 30 cans of baked beans, and you don’t even eat beans!! 🙈😋 #BlackFriday #PoorPaAtTheEnd 😢 pic.twitter.com/XeJnQKMt3A
— DJ Fresh (Big Dawg) (@DJFreshSA) November 24, 2017
Footage from Game Gateway apparently … madness of #BlackFriday continues pic.twitter.com/Pjji9fjnxE
— TiaraRay (@SydenhamStekkie) November 24, 2017
Our people have been brain washed by American trends and its so sad 😩 #BlackFriday pic.twitter.com/xylRbd6gr3
— BIG T (@TbangSA) November 24, 2017
Hey guys that’s it for me for being in a mall today that was a different level of craziness I just witnessed at Somerset Mall #BlackFriday
— Marvin X (@Real_Marvin5J) November 24, 2017
The traffic on great east road and Manda Hill #smh #BlackFriday
— Mwaba Mulekaleka (@Mwaba09) November 24, 2017
REMEMBER:
If you are buying something you don’t need in the name of Black Friday & because it’s cheap then 👇 👇 👇 👇 👇 #BlackFriday pic.twitter.com/FSdjH8nw4b
— Man’s Not Barry Roux (@AdvBarryRoux) November 24, 2017