neverbuyretail said:I saw the video link posted above. And that's pretty accurate to what was happening at WalMart BF. Below is my story.
I was able to score 2 of the 42" plasma tv's.
But WalMart BF was a joke.
They only had 6 in the entire store (SuperWalmart) with 1,000's of people making a line (thinking that they could get one). They only had 2 wall mount units, yet there were 6 tv sets. Like an idiot, I had camped out the night before.
WalMart BF was total chaos.
WalMart didn't even have many of the "BF items" ready for purchase. It almost felt like a bait and switch.
Someone, who was one of the first on line, devised a numbering system. The dude actually brought a roll of tickets with numbers and passed them out. At first, I thought he worked for WalMart but he didn't. I guess he wanted to keep things civil (which would have been cool if it would have happened).
Near riots almost broke out when the dumbarse WalMart Manager came out and said that he wasn't honoring the ticket system. Then people who showed up at 4 am, simple walked up to the front of the line and started waiting for the store to open. Mind you, there were people waiting since 10pm the night before (I, myself got there at 11:30pm). It started to get nasty and the cops were called. At least 3 police cars responded. The guy, who came up with the system informed was talking to the lead officer. And everyone who had waited all night with their tickets pleaded with the officer to enforce the ticket system. The officer got on a loud horn and claimed that the ticket system was going to be used. "If you didn't have a ticket, you we not going to get in."
As soon, as 5am showed up, the idiot of a manager opened the doors. And guess what? A freakin stampede takes place. People were like animals. Mind you, I'm a big burly guy; I wasn't about to get pushed around. People ran inside and pushing people like if they were passing out gold bars. I was there early enough, that I should have received a laptop. But for such a large store, they only had 10 laptops. They were gone FAST!
I wasn't going to spend all that time and end up with nothing. So I saw 2 - 42" plasma tvs (which was out of 6) and lugged them into my cart. A freak store clerk was literally throwing out portable DVD players. One of which hit me on the side of my chest as people where trying to pull one in (It almost looked like a jump ball in basketball with players diving for a ball). At that point, I nearly exploded. I yelled at the clerk, "We are not animals and I don't want your crappy dvd player". He tried to get a "I work here and I could you kicked out of here" attitude. At which point, I just walked away because I could have just punched him in the face. I wasn't about to get arrested for assaulting a 20-year-old blue apron WalMart "Associate".
I paid and got the hell out of there. I ended up keeping a plasma and sold another to a friend at cost. Who, in turn, sold me a BestBuy $378 laptop at cost. It worked out.
Meantime, my friend was a BestBuy and things were totally different. The store passed out numbers. They offered people coffee and doughnuts. They passed out papers for those who wanted particular items, laptops, desktops, etc. Which I thought was cool because that way one would know early if you had a chance to score a particular item. And not wait all night to find out they didn't have enough. BestBuy had 30 of the $378 laptop. My friend got 2 (he was with his 16 year old kid who got a ticket for one too). And they let everyone in slowly (none of this stampede crap taking place).
I don't work for BestBuy or WalMart. I too have taken advantage of both via FW. But I will never do WalMart BF again. You would think that the nations largest retailer (after screwing up last year and not having a BF), they would have their stuff in order. Ol' Sam Walton would be spinning in his grave.
And for all this, I give WalMart - THE FINGER!
I'm in south Florida, btw.
I worked BF at a very large Best Buy for five years (1996-2000). We had a system down where we asked people in line for opening what they were there for, and then gave them a ticket for that item. We limited the tickets depending on the quantity on hand, but that way the people that were there early got their item and there was no need for pushing. It made it much more fun, and people joked around with each other and the employees. We also gave out directions to people in line of where things were in the store so there wouldn't be chaos and people running around. We had orderly lines and people knew they were getting what they came for and were more willing to be patient. |
