By the time you read this, I’m hoping it will have snowed. At least that is what the weather channel says. Putting it into perspective, I’m writing this a week in advance with the thought that Americans will have celebrated Thanksgiving the day before and it is currently Black Friday. Happy Thanksgiving weekend, y’all.
For today’s Freedom Friday, let’s have a look at shopping on Black Friday. Is it worth it?
In recent years, Canada has played host to Black Friday deals offered to Americans. That’s how I had purchased my new laptop last year. I managed to pick up one of those fancy IPS touch screen laptops. It’s a beautiful machine, fully loaded and made to last. Only, you wouldn’t have found me lining up in front of the store. Shortly after midnight, when the online specials had gone live, so did the thrifty shoppers with their clickers. I was one of them. I’d saved $200 on that deal alone. The next weeks leading up to Christmas, that same laptop had gone back up to the regular price.
Worth it? Definitely.
In 2010, as part of a promotional deal, an unknown site was raffling off several Apple iPod touch at half-price. To give you an idea how it worked, a shopper had to click an “I want one” button, fill in their credit card details in the form, and submit. The site had only 70 devices available, displaying also the amount of shoppers wanting one. The odds? 1,200 to 70. You guessed it. I won the chance to purchase the device at half-price. I saved $160. At the time, it was the best Christmas ever.
I’m also a finicky buyer when it comes to headphones. My ears are important to me, and how I feed them is equally important. Being a Tinnitus sufferer—that’s ringing in the ears to all you folks who are wondering—I make sure when I purchase headphones or earbuds that they are of the highest quality. Anyway, one year I’d wandered into the Best Buy in town to see what deals they had to offer in the audio department. I wasn’t expecting much. I figured everyone had already picked over the spoil. But to my surprise I found a top-of-the-line pair of Sennheiser earbuds stuck behind the cheapies stock on the shelf. I’m assuming someone had placed them there for safekeeping until such a time when they could come back and purchase them. Total savings for that purchase was $200.
There are other deals. Like the $250 my kid saved last year for his very first laptop, the $75 for my first Apple iPod classic in 2007, and the $90 for my second Apple iPod classic in 2009.
Adding it all up makes for quite a chunk of change. Is Black Friday worth it? I don’t know. You do the math and tell me what you think?
Do you shop on Black Friday? What did you pick up that made the day special?
Looking to God 
Another Sennheiser man. I’m on my second pair and woldn’t use any other brand. Don’t shop on Black Friday. I look for deals all year round which saves money, but can take ages to buy the simplest things.
This year, I’m entirely shopping online. Hard not to, considering the prices are the same, if not, better than in the store. And it saves me the time to hop in the car to drive all that way then finding out they’re currently out of stock for that store. There are only two gifts I can’t get online and that’s because they are specialty items.
BTW, love Sennheiser products. They have such a natural and warm sound. I love the impact they give when playing rock music.
Good pot. I also have Tinnitus and earbuds are important. I need the noise deadening kind. (my Tinnitus takes the form of a cicada). Good shopping.
Mine is a single pitch in my left ear that raises and lowers based on my stress level. Most of the time, I don’t hear it unless I’m paying attention to it, like now. Yes, mine sounds like a cicada, but it never ever ends.
Mine never goes away either. It used to be like the blades of a helicopter only quieter and I used to tell myself it was the attic fan. It changed about seven years ago to a cicada. I liked the helicopter better.
Cicada is all I’ve known. I can’t even imagine what a helicopter would sound like. Whatever the sound, we eventually get used to it and move on. I’ve read of cases where there are fluctuating notes between both ears. Whatever that sounds like, I’m sure I would have ended up in an insane asylum, had I suffered it.
Think Van Gogh. 🙂
You should look out for Bang & Olufsen beoplay headphones. I noticed them on sale and they are the best quality ever!
I haven’t tried them, but thank for the recommendation!
You will NEVER see me on that line!!
Have a great weekend,
From Pacific Paratrooper ___