After years of being trained to dread contacting a company via phone, lest we get trapped in the automated phone tree, customers are turning to e-mail for resolving their customer service issues. And while a new study shows that a majority of the top online retailers did a passable job of replying to customer inquiries, a handful of websites apparently decided to give their e-mail customer service teams some extra time off this holiday season. [More]
backlash friday
Alleged Walmart Pepper-Sprayer Turns Self In But Won't Talk To Cops
By 11.28.11
By now you’ve likely heard about the Walmart shopper who police originally said used pepper spray to give herself a competitive advantage while bargain hunting on Black Friday. In the days since that incident made national news, the woman believed to be responsible for injuring at least 20 people has turned herself in to the the authorities — but she’s not really giving much of an explanation for why she thought a cloud of pepper spray would be a good idea. [More]
Malls To Track Shoppers' Movements Via Cellphone Signals This Holiday Season
By 11.22.11
Because you as a shopper are nothing but a lab rat to be tracked, measured, quantified and dissected so that retailers can market to you in a more efficient manner, at least two malls will be using shoppers’ cellphone signals to map out their routes from Sbarro to the Spencer Gifts to Chess King (okay okay… so I haven’t been to the mall in a while). [More]
Stay In Bed: Black Friday May Not Be The Best Time To Buy That TV You Want
By 11.21.11
As we mentioned last week, just because retailers are offering deep discounts on some electronics doesn’t mean there will be savings on the particular item you’re after. Now there is some science to back that up. [More]
5 Things You Should Know About Black Friday
By 11.18.11
As we mentioned earlier this week, some people have already begun camping out to get in line for this year’s Black Friday sales. But are these people going to actually see any big savings or have they just given in to the annual hype machine surrounding the super shopping day? [More]
Tampa Woman Lines Up 9 Days Early For Best Buy's Black Friday Sale
By 11.17.11
While thousands of people her age are busy camping out in various Occupy movements around the country, a Florida woman decided last night to occupy the sidewalk outside her local Best Buy in order to be the first person to be disappointed by the Black Friday offerings on Nov. 25. [More]
Target Responds To Workers Who Don't Want To Work Thanksgiving Night
By 11.16.11
Earlier this week, we wrote about how one Target employee had started a petition asking the retailer to cancel its plans to open at midnight after Thanksgiving. And even though the petition now has more than 100,000 names, Target is shrugging it off because that employee wasn’t scheduled to work that night anyway. [More]
Target Employees Fight Back Against Store's Plan To Open Thanksgiving Night
By 11.14.11
Because people simply can not wait until after they’ve digested their turkey to cash in on deep discounts, many of the major retail chains are opening earlier than usual on Black Friday this year. This is not sitting well with thousands of Target employees who have signed a petition for the store to at least let them finish their pumpkin pie before having to report to work. [More]
