Walmart might have had some decent toy prices on Black Friday, but a new report says that not only did those low prices not last — many of them went up.

According to a Nov. 30 e-mail obtained by Bloomberg News, Walmart HQ instructed store managers to immediately jack up prices on 1,800 different toys “to better enable your store and the company to have a successful financial month.”

Experts say this directive stands out from the retail giant’s policy in holiday shopping seasons past.

“In previous years Wal-Mart has come out and hammered everyone with unbelievably low toy prices,” explains the director of the Center for Digital Strategies at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. “They stepped away from that this year, and after Thanksgiving their prices have crept back up… Most of their hot toys are out of stock and the stuff that is there is not low-priced.”

A rep for the company tells Bloomberg that the price increase was just a response to existing rollbacks on those items: “Once a rollback ends, the item returns to its original everyday low price.”

Have any parents out there noticed if the prices on Walmart toys have increased dramatically? And are you doing your holiday toy shopping at Walmart or at a different store?

Wal-Mart Raising Toy Prices, Squeezing More Out of Holidays [Bloomberg]

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.