Bargain-Hunting SGs Kill WalMart Employee

[glendalais]

CBC News: Wal-Mart worker dies, trampled by shoppers

To think that the poor thing died so that these SGs could have (going off my local WalMart circular) $69.00 digital cameras, $128.00 Blue Ray Players, and a $199.00 XBOX 3.....almost all of which I'm sure won't be used very much after the holiday season.

Such a shame :( .

[mechurchlady]

At the restaurant them girls have Black Friday down to a science. it is no the half price stuff also, lots of sales but you got to be one of the first few. It is sad taht people have to do Black Friday. I will not be near a mall for the next few days even if you pay me.

It is sad that people would kill someone to get the sale.

[Canuikstan]

Being Canadian, we don't have 'Black Friday', but we do have it's wicked step sister, 'Boxing Day' which is the day after Christmas.

It's the day when all the stores dump their overstock from the Christmas holidays and the deals are on par with BF.

Boxing day sales are a relatively new phenomena here also.. as it was once against the law for stores to be open.

But that Changed in 2000...
Anywho... to TRY to keep this on topic... on Dec 26th, 2003, my brother and myself ventured out to the local Best Buy at 5 am to see what deals we could get.. it was about -10 Celcius (so.. about 14 F?) and windy and dark.

We arrive, figureing we would just sit in the car till the 6am opening, and see a line all the way around the back of the building. A staff member is handing out numbered tickets.. i am ticket 335 and my brother 336...

So we cliimb out and get in line and wait in the freezing cold.. and wait and wait.. at 5:55 an employee comes out and says they will be letting people in the store in groups of 10.

At 5:59, the line starts moving.. FAST.. faster then 10 people at a time.. in fact, we got to the doors in about 1 minute.. why? Because no one was willing to wait outside in the freezing cold anymore.
EVERYONE rushed into the store, and it was chaos...

We ended up not getting a single thing, because we were to busy avoiding the arguments, messes and fights that were going on everywhere..

we ended up turning and leaving.. and i have never, and will never, ever attempt this again.

why do stores put themselves through this mess?

[DisneyMom]

I think I recall people killing each other recently over places in line for the latest electronic gamebox....Ugh, people are so materialistic! :mad:
I absolutely HATE the pressure we feel over trying to MAKE your family happy for a few hours on that one day.....that's why we just buy our APs each year, and we have Christmas all year long. My son with autism is planning to volunteer at the local Adult Day Health Care, and Hubby and I are going to look for an opportunity to help somewhere too.

[Cranbiz]

I was out today at a walmart. The crowds at this one were pretty civil. Yes, there was a rush to grab things, yes, the aisles were so crowded that it took me 20 minutes to leave the store from electronics. However, at the GPS pallets (yes, that is where I was, I have a very directionally challanged daughter) customers were actually handing out units to other customers.

We did have our share of line cutters at the checkouts but it did not help them a bit.

Now, at the walmart in Sanford (about 10 minutes from me), there was a riot and Seminole County Sherriffs (a lot of them) had to come and keep the peace.

Was not bad enough to make the tv news though.

[mechurchlady]

In a Palm Desert Toys-R-Us store some people ran into each other and started shooting. Two are dead and guns found near by. Ine man heard on the cell phone his wife panicing because of the shooting and trying to hide. Customers did not know if it was a terrorist attack, robbery or what. Imagine to sworn enemies dukingit out in a kids' toy store.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/ ... 7468.shtml

At least four people were injured in the Wal-Mart that the employee was killed. They actually ripped the doors off the hinges according to my local news channel.

http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/2008 ... frida.html
Check out the black cat in the parking lot at a store where a lady got hurt.

[glendalais]

Being Canadian, we don't have 'Black Friday', but we do have it's wicked step sister, 'Boxing Day' which is the day after Christmas.

It's the day when all the stores dump their overstock from the Christmas holidays and the deals are on par with BF.

Boxing day sales are a relatively new phenomena here also.. as it was once against the law for stores to be open.

But that Changed in 2000...
Anywho... to TRY to keep this on topic... on Dec 26th, 2003, my brother and myself ventured out to the local Best Buy at 5 am to see what deals we could get.. it was about -10 Celcius (so.. about 14 F?) and windy and dark.

We arrive, figureing we would just sit in the car till the 6am opening, and see a line all the way around the back of the building. A staff member is handing out numbered tickets.. i am ticket 335 and my brother 336...

So we cliimb out and get in line and wait in the freezing cold.. and wait and wait.. at 5:55 an employee comes out and says they will be letting people in the store in groups of 10.

At 5:59, the line starts moving.. FAST.. faster then 10 people at a time.. in fact, we got to the doors in about 1 minute.. why? Because no one was willing to wait outside in the freezing cold anymore.
EVERYONE rushed into the store, and it was chaos...

We ended up not getting a single thing, because we were to busy avoiding the arguments, messes and fights that were going on everywhere..

we ended up turning and leaving.. and i have never, and will never, ever attempt this again.

why do stores put themselves through this mess?

Ugh, I hate Boxing Day.

When I was younger, my mom insisted on waking me up at 1-2 AM in the morning and taking me with her as she drove like a madwomen over the border into Ontario or New York (under Provincial law, the stores in Quebec don't open for their Boxing Day sales until 12 or 1 PM).

We would spend the morning shopping and then turn right back around and speed back to Montreal to shop our way down St-Laurent.

It's the one thing I loved when we moved to the US - she, for whatever reason, doesn't do the same thing on Black Friday, lol.

</end rant :p: >

[felinefan]

No matter how you look at it, it was bad enough that poor guy was only getting maybe $7-$8/hr. to work there for a few weeks. That kind of money isn't worth putting your life in danger for. Especially bad was the fact that the store called the cops to keep order, but they were called away to other stores right before the crowd pushed the doors in.

In the future I think they should take the rifles from the sporting goods department and aim them at the crowds trying to push their way inside: "You feelin' lucky, punks? Get away from those doors and just wait. Otherwise, you're gonna be havin' a dead Christmas. Our store, our rules, ya dig? And no shoving and pushing to get in. You start acting up, this store's gonna be havin' a special on corpses." :twisted:

[Ms. Matterhorn]

http://www.walmart-blows.com/

[Shorty82]

In the future I think they should take the rifles from the sporting goods department and aim them at the crowds trying to push their way inside: "You feelin' lucky, punks? Get away from those doors and just wait. Otherwise, you're gonna be havin' a dead Christmas. Our store, our rules, ya dig? And no shoving and pushing to get in. You start acting up, this store's gonna be havin' a special on corpses." :twisted:

That reminds me a little uncomfortably of the situation at the Pace, FL Wal*Mart shortly after Hurricane Ivan came through. The power was out to the entire area and the store was running on generators so there was a limit to what was on. For security and safety reasons they were only letting in a few customers at a time so there was a line of people waiting to get in stretching from the door, around the Garden department, and back towards Automotive.

Well, in addition to the sheriff deputies armed with just their sidearms watching the crowd there were National Guardsmen armed with assault rifles out there also. It was weird enough waiting in line just to get into the store but the heavily armed Guardsmen made it down right freaky. Don't get me wrong, I love the National Guard and all they did to help get the area back on it's feet but I was used to seeing them unarmed and directing traffic, handing out water and MREs, etc. not standing guard with assault rifles outside of the damn Wal*Mart.