Why Walmart is dead to me.

So we’re all familiar with Black Friday, my favorite day of the year.  (Ok, I like Halloween, too.  And my birthday.  And random Saturdays in the fall.  But shopping for the best deals of the year?  Ranks up there.)  This year several stores are getting in on the action early, with “Early Black Friday!” or “Pre-Black-Friday!” sales.  One of these, is everyone’s favorite “This store is too freaking big I can’t find anything none of the employees have a freaking clue why the hell am I here?” store – Walmart.

Walmart ran ads saying that Sat. Nov. 7th was going to kick off their season of sales by being the day to pick up electronics on the very very cheap.  Joe and I happen to be in the market for a flat TV.  The fact that we own 3 perfectly good TV’s doesn’t really matter. Well, it doesn’t matter to me.  Joe is of the opinion that one television per member of the family is crazy, but I am of the opinion that having a giant armoire holding a giant TV in the living room is crazy considering we can just buy one that hangs on the wall.  I have brought him around to my way of thinking, and showing him this ad finished the job.  Walmart was practically giving away televisions!  A 42 inch LCD w/ high resolution for…. $498!  Holy crow.  Look at this beauty!  Cnet.com called it “the best LCD TV we tested.”  We have never owned anywhere near a 42 inch TV before.  Never really even considered it.  But now it would be ours ours ours.

I went to the store on Thursday to scope them out.  They had one on display (wow – 42 inches is large), but none on the shelf.  I asked an employee how it would go down on Saturday, and he told me that they would start selling them at midnight Friday night.  Ooh!  Glad I had this conversation!  I drank coffee with dinner last night, and psyched myself up to do a little late-night-bargain-shopping.

Got there at 10pm, went straight to electronics… still no stack of TV’s. When I asked the guy behind the counter when they would wheel them out, how this would work, etc, he looked at me like I was a moron and said “Yeah – it’s a SATURDAY sale.  They’ll “wheel them out” tomorrow morning.”  Dammit.   I was all full of caffeine and aggravation, and now had to wake up freaking early on a Saturday.  Wonderful.

This morning I watched the sunrise while I got a breakfast sandwich (I like to get my week’s worth of fat all in one go) from McDonalds. The teenager at the window told me I was “looking very pretty this morning!”, so I guess last night’s make-up was still going strong. I waltzed into Walmart at 6:10 a-freaking-m, almost a full two hours before the stuff was going on sale, and about three full hours before I’d like to be out of bed on a Saturday. I strolled towards electronics feeling confidant, and when I saw a small line of less than ten people I practically did an undignified happy dance right there in the aisle.

I was pulling out my iPod and greasy sandwich when the employee in charge of crowd control asked me what I was there for.  I foolishly gestured to the line and said “I’m here for this!”, like the TV was the only thing they were selling today.  Yes, now that I’ve Googled all mention of the sale, I see that they were also giving away Xboxes and Blue-ray players, but when I was originally reading this stuff I only saw  TV! 42 INCHES! LCD! Less than FIVE-HUNDRED DOLLARS!!!!

Back to Wally World – the very tired and cranky-looking (“I can’t BELIEVE I pulled this shift with all these early-morning, bargain-hunting LOSERS!”) employee slooowly asked me again “What. Are. You. Here. For?” and I replied (also slowly – it’s my way.) “I’m. Here. For. The. 42. Inch. Television.”  Which is when she dropped the bomb – “We’re already out of those.”

Wha?

At my blank look she said “They’re gone.  They’re all sold out. It’s too late.”

Huh?

I looked back at the line.  Seriously – less than 10 people.  I looked at her.  She said… wait for it….

“We only got three of them.”

Three.  Three televisions for the only Walmart in Shreveport, population 200,145.  (Ok, exaggeration. I looked it up, and apparently there are four Walmarts in Shreveport.  So I guess there were 12 available TV’s today.)

She said this with no embarrassment, no sign that it was a horrible, vile, dishonest thing that her store was doing. After advertising online and in print, getting people to get out of bed (twice, if they were first told to come in the middle of the night. Jerks.) for this… they only had three.  Just enough so they could legitimately claim to have sold these TV’s for that price… but not so many to actually affect their bottom line.

I walked away from there, vowing never to bring my business back to Walmart. Ever. I’m done. They’re dead to me.  I’m Target’s girl, now.  Walmart can keep their bargains and their useless employees and their huge stores that it takes 15 min to “run” into to buy a gallon of milk.  I’m finished.  They can close down for all I care.  In fact, I hope they do.  I’m never going back again.  They will not see another dollar from me.  Hmph.

 

(On the way out, I bought Violet a Christmas dress.  It was only $16.50, and it is gold and sparkly and has puffy sleeves and a tulle skirt and Target’s start at $29 and are simpler and therefore less likely to make V squeal with delight.  But now that I”m out of the store – really – I’m done.  I’m never going back.)

(Wait – I just remembered that starting today they are selling turkeys for 47 cents a pound.  Dammit.  But seriously – after I get a turkey (Fine. Two turkeys.) I’m really, forever and ever, done with that freaking store and their ridiculous fake bargains.  Drag my butt out of bed before the sun.  Grumble grumble foul curse words grumble. )

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