Black Friday Sucks Now

We used to be a country. A proper country.

We used to beat the shit out of each other for a chance at a TV for 80% off. Now? It’s just a chance for companies to dump the garbage that nobody wants for a WHOPPING *15% off*.

Now, it’s nothing more than a corporate stunt trading on the history of the holiday weekend, all to try and get people to impulse buy something for basically full price. Honestly I think memorial day had better deals.

When I was in high school, I lived kind of near the Philadelphia premium outlets, and it was a whole spectacle. The entire town surrounding the outlets would show out, helping with parking, offering hot chocolate, etc. for the shoppers who started rolling in on the evening of Thanksgiving.

Average Black Friday Experience in the past

It was fun in a way. It was like stepping into the wilderness in the OG Runescape — a normally peaceful world suddenly transformed into a PvP arena where anything goes.

will trade rune scimy for gf

Housewives transmogrified into berserkers for a single night, people pulling guns on each other, women beating up children, everyone a willful participant in our consumerist version of The Purge…

Real talk, bringing your kid to Black Friday was hella irresponsible lol. Part of my feelings in writing this article is definitely a lamentation of the physical death of Black Friday — the eCom portion is very much alive and well, as evidenced by Shopify’s BFCM real-time data, but I can’t help but feel that this is more so inertia from what Black Friday was in the past than actual good shopping deals.

I’ve also noticed quite a few big-name stores rebranding full-price items as BF sales (Target seemingly the number 1 culprit), and in a few cases, things have been marked up. Here’s an item on Walmart’s website that I’ve been following closely, hoping for a sale of some kind:

This item has actually been marked UP by $190 — its normal list price on pretty much every other website (Williams Sonoma, etc.) is $700. The Breville Barista Express also doesn’t appear to be on sale anywhere, which is a real shame, as that integrated bean grinder is a great countertop space saver.

If we hop over to Target’s homepage, one of their “top deals“ is $50 off an xbox (a 3-year-old system btw), a staggering 10%.

@mamicouponzBlack friday shopping tip! There is a ton of good deals for black friday, but that doesnt necessarily mean everything that says black friiday is the best deal. Always do your research and save your $ 😍 #blackfriday #blackfridaydeals #shopping

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If you check Best Buy, you’ll also see the exact same deals that Target is running, which a) is a little suspect, and b) means you can’t leverage different retailers to actually save in any meaningful way.

So, where did all the deals go? I mean it’s not really surprising that the in-person portion is dying off, even though there’s plenty of videos of people going HAM on each other, even in 2020 during the height of the pandemic. Still, it feels weird that the in-person portion just completely died over the last year or two.

I’d normally jump to thinking that this is just an aberration brought on by the current economic uncertainty or something, but people are still definitely buying a shit load of things, so that doesn’t really explain why companies aren’t putting out. my best guess is that it comes down to two things:

-Black Friday essentially starts on November 1st now, as companies realize that customers have a fixed budget and want to beat others to the punch, by offering their deals earlier

-The post-covid world feels entirely fake. The entire world just feels completely numb to itself as of late, and that apathy is beginning to bleed into the fibers of our society (you might have noticed that everyone seems to be driving way more recklessly as well, small things like this that show some societal decay)

I’m not really sure where to leave this honestly — I imagine that Black Friday won’t last another 5 years. All-in-all, this is probably for the best as we should all probably buy less junk, but sadly it does make shopping for Christmas gifts a bit more expensive.

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Anyway, as this relates to clothes, there’s a ton of “up to 40% off“ sales, but does anyone really fall for that anymore? Anything good either isn’t discounted or is maybe 15% off if you’re lucky. The 40% stuff is just some throwaway junk that won’t sell because it was a stupid idea to make in the first place.

I’ve only found a few sales that I’ve had any real interest in:

Jack Donnelly has 30% off using code BF30 at checkout (very nice chinos made in the USA, and a small business to boot).

Tracksmith has some BF specials plus an extra 20% off with code HARVEST. Really good chance to save on some high-quality merino activewear.

Polo Ralph Lauren is still running its tried-and-true 40% off $125+ purchases

Proper Cloth is running a sale AND you get 10% off if you’re a first time buyer by using my personal discount code FC10 ;^). No idea if it stacks or not, so if you do end up using it, please let me know.