While the trend of not opening on Thanksgiving Day and making sure everyone knows it spreads across the retailscape, some stores are sticking with the previous trend of opening on the holiday. One example: Macy’s, which apparently has been so successful with the practice that it’s reportedly moving its Thanksgiving Day opening time back an hour, to 5 PM. [More]
black thursday
Mall Of America, Staples, BJ’s Make Sure You Know They’re Closed On Thanksgiving
By 10.5.16 — Updated: 11.14.16
It was about five years ago that the Thanksgiving shopping trend began to metastasize throughout the retail business: opening times on Black Friday crept back from the wee hours of Black Friday morning to the late hours of Thanksgiving. Malls joined big-box stores, and Thanksgiving Day was fun for a few years. Then a widespread backlash began, and retailers took advantage of that. [More]
Retailers Are Wearing Us Down: Shoppers Don’t Mind Holiday Creep So Much
By 9.20.16
Holiday Creep, and more specifically Christmas Creep, are common annoyances of modern shopping. When the school supplies disappear from shelves, the Christmas trees and lights appear, making shoppers feel like the holiday season begins earlier and earlier every year. This is becoming more normal, though: some recent survey results show that fewer Americans find Christmas Creep less annoying than in previous years. They’re wearing us down. [More]
Target Will Open At 6:00 PM On Thanksgiving Day
By 11.9.15
We could be incredibly lazy today, since it turns out that Target’s Black Friday plans are pretty much identical to what they did last year. They’re opening at 6 PM on Thanksgiving Day, which is also what they did last year. They’re starting Black Friday-style deals on November 9 instead of November 10, so we’d have to change that. Otherwise? Pretty much the same. [More]
Macy’s Stores Will Open At 6 P.M. On Thanksgiving Day
By 10.29.15
If you were worried that you might have to spend all of Thanksgiving Day at home and not inside a Macy’s store, there’s no need to worry. The department store chain will open on Brown Thursday at 6 P.M., allowing employees some of the holiday with their families if they choose to or are asked to work. [More]
Boston Market: Official Caterer Of People Stuck At Work On Thanksgiving
By 11.21.14
One company has definitely benefited from the trend of retailers opening before dinner time on Thanksgiving Day: Boston Market, the restaurant chain that serves fast casual poultry and traditional side dishes year-round. The chain does plenty of rotisserie chicken and mashed potato business year-round and has always been a popular spot for quick dinners and catering on Thanksgiving, but its catering sales have increased for the last few years. [More]
Lewis Black Rants About The Expansion Of Black Friday
By 11.20.14
Most Americans don’t go shopping on Black Friday or on Thanksgiving Day, but it remains a popular topic for us in the media to yap about. This year, the increasing number of stores opening on Thanksgiving Day and growing controversy over the practice has prompted Lewis Black, professional ranter, to weigh in. [More]
Poll Results: Most Americans Don’t Shop On Thanksgiving Or Black Friday
By 11.19.14
Whether stores plan to open to shoppers on Thanksgiving Day or not, there would be no American Shopping Frenzy Long Weekend at all if people weren’t going to head out there and shop. Yet who are the people who have clamored to go out and shop on Thanksgiving Day? How many Americans are really going to hit the stores at the end of next week? The results of two polls can give us some insight. [More]
Christopher & Banks, C.J. Banks To Defy Mall Fines, Close On Thanksgiving Day
By 11.18.14
You may not have heard of the clothing store chain Christopher & Banks/C.J. Banks, but that’s probably because you’re not a woman of a certain age or a certain dress size. They’re a chain that sells clothing aimed at mature women. The important thing to know, other than that they sell some nice corduroys, is that the chain is defying the malls where it rents and staying closed on Thanksgiving Day this year. [More]
Best Buy Also Has Better Things To Do Than Eat Turkey, Will Open At 5 P.M. On Thanksgiving
By 11.11.14
We’ve been here before; it’s all so familiar! Ah, yes. That’s because we just wrote earlier today that RadioShack will open its doors at 8 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day, and yesterday that Target would open at 5 p.m. and so on and so forth. Best Buy is here to join the club of businesses who have better things to do than gorge on holiday feasts and snore off into a happy slumber, and will be open from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m. on Thanksgiving. [More]
Black Thursday Is No Big Deal In These Three States — Because It’s Illegal
By 11.27.13
Twas the night of Thanksgiving and no shoppers were stirring, not even Neighbor Bob who is always up to something. At least, they won’t be in three states where Black Thursday is actually against the law. In Rhode Island, Maine and Massachusetts, most big stores are barred from opening on Thanksgiving day. [More]
Simon Mall Worker Opposes Thanksgiving Day Opening, Starts Petition
By 11.20.13
We don’t put much faith in online petitions as agents of change, but they can empower people who have no other way to speak out. That’s the case for a worker at the Menlo Park Mall in Edison, N.J. who is wholeheartedly against his the mall’s plan to open during the evening of Thanksgiving Day. [More]
Costco, BJ’s Would Rather Have Their Employees Spend Thanksgiving At Home
By 11.14.13
This year, everyone from Kmart to Macy’s to Staples will be celebrating the time-honored tradition of ruining Thanksgiving by throwing open their doors early to shoppers eager to flee the company of their families in favor of door-buster deals on junk the stores are desperate to get rid of. But some retailers simply refuse to get into the spirit of Black Thursday and won’t open until — get this — the day after Thanksgiving. [More]
Insider: Everyone At Best Buy Dreads 6 P.M. Thanksgiving Day Opening
By 11.13.13
We’ve been writing a lot about major retailers’ plans to open on Thanksgiving Day. In case it isn’t clear, we aren’t fans of this phenomenon. According to to our poll data, our mailbox, and comments left here on the site, neither are our readers. We received a lengthy rant from an anonymous Geek Squad agent about how things look right now at Best Buy, and what workers at Big Yellow and Blue have to look forward to. [More]
We Disagree With This Fake Overview Of Black Friday Sales
By 11.12.13
This satirical Onion overview of Black Friday sales is funny and all, but we’re pretty sure that they printed an error. The store that’s offering a “[c]omplimentary all-encompassing sadness and pervasive sense that your life wasn’t supposed to be like this with every purchase” is actually Kmart. And it starts at 6 A.M. on Thanksgiving Day. [The Onion] [More]
Best Buy Knows You Want To Waste Thanksgiving Camping Out For Stuff You Could Probably Buy Online For Less
By 11.8.13
It’s a little-known fact that at the first Thanksgiving feast, some of the pilgrims were sitting around the table while wishing in their heart of hearts that they were camped outside the local loom-and-musket shop in hopes of snatching up bargains. Hundreds of years later, Best Buy is finally honoring that wish by opening up at 6 p.m. on Turkey Day. [More]
Deals Are Better On Thanksgiving Than On Black Friday, And I Hate Everything
By 9.23.13
Here at Consumerist, we’ve been vociferously against Black Friday creep, the slow slide of the first official day of holiday shopping frenzy back into Thanksgiving Day. Last year, we supported retail employees who were against opening on Thanksgiving, and humbly suggested that retailers just go ahead and move Black Friday back a week. No one is listening to us. [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]
