This candid group portrait reflects the anticipation yet the boredom that was going on in the front of the line at the Best Buy on Blanding Blvd in Jacksonville. Some people are smoking, some are chatting; some people are smiling and others are ready to finally get into the store. The police presence is also apparent. Some people seem to react negatively and almost paranoid when there’s a law enforcer around, as if they’re out to get them – as if they’re there to watch your every move.
How many televisions do you really need? How many will you buy in a lifetime?
The row of cashiers at Wal-Mart is always somewhat disastrous between the slew of people, hap-hazardous cashiers in crunch time, and the aftermath debris of receipts and plastic bags that is left on the ground. It can really be a war zone. On this day, this store had every single register open, each of which had a line several people long (almost all with television sets).
There’s something to be said about our cheap electronic and appliances. Sometimes, they’re just so cheap that they’re not financially worth repair and maintenance. For less than what it would cost to get some appliances repaired or fixed, say for a coffee maker or a toaster, you can get a new one. So you just throw the other one out. Where did our quality products go? One that you would buy once and would last you a lifetime?
That’s my goal when buying most things – buy it for life. Buy it once, maintain it, and have it last as long as possible.
The doors are open and the wallets come out. People scream with excitement. Young, old, men and women, all in search of the bargain electronic door busters.
As Best Buy was doing their final preparations to finally open, I did my last tour around the line that wrapped around the corner and found this gem. The photo says more than I can describe, though. The young man is sitting, watching the entertaining people. The police are there to prevent and stampeding and overall chaos. And it’s all taking place at Best Buy, one of the more popular and busy Black Friday retailers.
Gotta love it.
My Black Friday plans didn’t even include my wallet. I decided to hitch around the area and see the crowds, as well as the inside action taking place at the registers and sales floors. My loop of stores included some of the more popular retailers: Target, Best Buy, Toys R Us, Wal-Mart, and even the Orange Park Mall (to my surprise). I was only able to actually go inside two of them, Wal-Mart and the OP Mall, as the other ones had lines that would have taken two hours to get through. But since those stores were only letting about fifty people through at a time, the action I was looking for wasn’t going to take place. Wal-Mart and the mall, on the other hand, had open doors. Wal-Mart was of course the most hectic, as they simply place palettes of merchandise our and have the customers fend for themselves, creating the most turmoil.