Posted on 11/26/2010 10:05:57 AM PST by traumer
BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Shoppers waited out in the cold wet weather for hours. When the doors opened at 4 a.m. the Black Friday chaos turned ugly.
*** VIDEO at the link ***
Seconds after the doors opened, something went dangerously wrong.
Crazed Black Friday shoppers began piling up on each other.
"It went from controlled to a mob in less than five minutes and it just got nasty," said a shopper.
When officials heard the screams, they ran over right away to help.
Shopper Rich Mathewson said, "It was a lot of angry people just jumping in after we waited patiently for a long time. It actually started way before that, people started getting angry at everybody."
After it happened, one man bent over in pain but he took off into the North Buffalo Target store seconds later, along with everyone else.
Seconds after the pile up, shoppers got back to business. News 4 called store officials to see if anyone was injured, but no one was available to comment.
(Excerpt) Read more at wivb.com ...
We drove past the mall here in Buffalo a while ago just to laugh at the nuts.
Then we went to a brand new store and picked up a 37 inch flat screen and a blu ray player for 408.00. Helps to know the owner who is also delivering and setting it up for free :)
My kind of shopping!
Here, here, 4yearlurker! That’s exactly how my two daughters and I do it.
“Everyone together at Christmas dinner puts a smile on my face.”
I wholeheartedly agree! There are no babies/kids around here yet [unfortunately], and we’ve all decided to not do much of anything, just a token gift. Not a one of us can think of anything we need that we don’t already have.
If I was making minimum wage I would likely be joining in with the crowd to get a fabulous deal on a big screen TV...both for the savings and the novelty of the experience (when you make minimum, you can't afford a whole lot of entertainment).
Same goes for the guy I saw camping out 7 hours early to get in for the midnight showing of Harry Potter. My first reaction was ridicule but then I thought "who am I to ridicule"? If that's the entertainment he can afford, let him enjoy himself. And I hope he had a good time.
Well done!
If I was manager of one of those stores I swear I’d put all the sale crap in a trailer or something and pull it up about 10 minutes after these lunatics stampeded into the store. People out to be ashamed.
Thanks for giving me an idea of what to do with my free time next year. :)
A good number of people slept in their cars to be the first shoppers at the Target Store in Bangor, ME. I guess TVs and other products were at half price. Inventory sold out quickly. All check out counters fully staffed. Extra cashiers on hand to give breaks.
Parking lot full.
Mad rush last weekend too! Bus loads of Canadians came down for holiday shopping. Hundreds car pooled as well.
Why would you refer to these white people as “white trash”.....
IMO, it’s the store’s fault. If you let people pile up in front of a door in a mob fashion, without having lines and enforcement of those lines (I’m talking a Disney like line)...then once you open a small door, compared to the mass of humanity outside the door, this sort of thing is going to happen.
We are now allowed less than 24 hours to give thanks before being thrown into Materialistic Friday.
Shame on shoppers today, who should be home counting their blessings.
I like this comment:
Oh, I am sure there will be those who will say, “He is a good man, she a good woman - church going, friendly - but they lost all semblance of humanity when they became crazed lemmings willing to injure, maim and kill to get their iPods, TV’s and games.
I’ll shop with the people when the animals go limping home.
It’s ‘BUY NOTHING DAY’ for me..... ;o)
RE: “People have scrimped and saved, sweating out inflation and their devalued money, and now they can get some deals they can afford. Watch the media pump it up as a sign the economy is improving. That will go along with a boost in employment preceding a sharp drop in January.”
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I’m not so sure the folks are scrimping and saving to get deals — seems to me it’s more like they are letting go of their welfare $$.
News reports (and video) from stores here in L.A. reflect that stores have been packed with people buying the latest electronics and similar gadgets, along with whatever else they think is a ‘bargain’ — and they are paying cash. Hmmm.............
And those ‘shoppers’ I’ve seen on the news don’t look like the people who shop where I like to shop — at the stores that did NOT open on Thanksgiving, or in the middle of the night or 5 a.m. Call me a snob but I prefer not making my Christmas purchases, including clothing, at stores that use grocery carts!
WHen this first started, it was a novelty, with the stores actually having to work to attract some shoppers that early.
Now it has become the “in” thing. 138 MILLION people are expected to shop today. Hundreds of people show up at a store that has 5 of each item, which you can print store maps showing the location. YOu have to rush in, because being first in line doesn’t mean anything, you have to actually make it to the loot.
It’s a system destined to reward boorish and uncivilized behavior. Some stores are smarter; they hand out tickets to people in line, but there are two problems — first, people just take tickets for things they don’t want, and give them to friends who show up later. And second, if you tell people in line that the tickets have run out, they will leave. And the whole point was to get people into your stores, having wasted hours, so they feel they HAVE to buy something to make their work pay off.
I’ve given up on these sales. My time is worth a lot more than the discounts. However, I find I can’t guy stuff at regular price if I know it was on sale, so these sales tend to discourage me.
And to make me feel better, I then skip going to the stores altogether, and order stuff online. It’s cheaper, and I can pretend I saved all the more time for not going to the store, to make up for the lost sale price.
Funny story. One year we went to a Target that was attached to a mall, but had it’s own separate doors. We were all lined up outside, since the mall itself wasn’t going to open until later. The line was very well-behaved, single-file down a sidewalk, because this was a few years ago. But that almost changed.
About 5 minutes before opening, a group of about 20 people were seen walking through the mall to the inside door. Turns out one of them worked in the mall, and had a key. They walked up to the interior door, and when the employee came out to unlock, they started knocking, and he started walking to their door to open it first.
Well, the first 10 or so people in line noticed and started screaming and pounding on the door. I doubt the employee could hear them, but just before unlocking the interior door, he figured out what was happening, and opened our doors first.
He still opened their door eventually, and they got in front of probably half our line, but at least there wasn’t a mob attack.
No sympathy here for these idiots.
I see now why its called Black Friday.
Re: “Just like the “running with the bulls”...
and............
“Lol - succinct description.”
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..........or water buffalo???????????????
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