just a thought..or a few

                                      

CRAZY People…..

November 23, 2012

            I currently work retail for a living. I use the term “currently” hoping that next year will be my last.  Specifically, I work for Target. Ah, yes, the competitor of Wal-mart and the only place where red and khaki are really acceptable colors worn together. I have worked at Target for almost six years, though I feel like it has been all my life. This is probably due to the fact that my stepmother has worked for Target for twenty two years and my dad actually worked there for about ten to twelve.

            Every year, shoppers gear up for Black Friday. If you don’t know what Black Friday is, first I think that you are full of it, but I will be nice and give you a quick insight of what you may possibly be missing out on. Keep in mind, this is the perspective of one that works for retail, not shopping it.

            Shoppers line up outside retail stores hours before opening, having hope they will get amazing deals on the same items the store carries year round. When the store opens, they are let in and in most cases, are pushed, shoved and sometimes even trampled on by the other shoppers. If a shopper makes it into the store alive and unharmed, they make their way around crowded aisles, anxiety at its fullest, just to find out the TV they hoped to get is gone since the store only had ten of them in stock. After spending fifteen to thirty minutes shopping, the shopper gets into yet another line where they wait two to three times as long as they shopped to check out. This is your typical Black Friday experience in a store.

            I have seen Target evolve as each year goes by. My first year, back in 2007, the store opened at six o’clock in the morning on Black Friday. As each year went by, the   earlier and earlier Target opened. This year, Target was opening their doors at 9pm on Thanksgiving! So, to please shoppers and make more money, I have to be in at 8pm to accommodate the rest of the world. Target is open 362 days out of the year. You would think that allowing your employees to enjoy their holidays wouldn’t be too much to ask for. They (the Target corporate people) tried “making it better” by offering a $1 extra in pay for time differential as well as a time period where time and a half was offered. Now this is nice, but I really would rather be stuffing my face with turkey and pumpkin pie at three o’clock in the afternoon versus celebrating my Thanksgiving at eleven in the morning.

            My rant is over, for now. My celebrity twist to this is: on Black Friday, I wonder if celebrities do their own shopping or do 1) they have a personal shopper they hired to do it for them or 2) do certain retailers allow them to purchase product ahead of time for the discounted price?

Chasity