21 Nov How to Spend Less On Black Friday and Get More!

We need to talk about one of the greatest holidays known to mankind, a day that we mark on our calendars for months in advance and spend hours of planning and strategizing with friends and family to ensure that it’s absolutely perfect…BLACK FRIDAY!!!! Let’s go over a few items and 2 simple rules that will help you spend less and get more during this crazy weekend.

No other holiday brings people from so many ethnicities, religions, socio-economic statuses and personality types together with such enthusiasm and vigor like this holiday. On this day, the “thanks” we ought to give is to the generous, brilliant corporate executives and marketing chieftans that make everyone else work on a lesser, stupidly-named holiday so we can shop on our day off! Thanks…giving? Like what the heck, dude? I’ll “give thanks” after I score a deal on those new linen sheets for the bed that are 60% off and if I’m able to get in line early enough to get a new 75″ flat screen (priced down 30%!!! Hallelujah!).

And if that wasn’t enough, it’s the perfect excuse to leave those annoying people you call “friends and family” that keep pestering you about why you’re still single and asking stupid questions like “whatever happened to that nice girl, Jennifer?” because they “care about you”. Well Granny, Jennifer and I didn’t see eye-to-eye on the importance of getting in line at Best Buy twelve hours in advance to get reserved tickets for the new Playstation Red Dead Redemption Two bundle so I dumped her like she was last week’s tuna casserole! 

Whoa. Got carried away there. Memories of previous feasting got to me. Okay, let’s get to some shopping details and how to spend less.

Rule #1 – Change your shopping mindset.

If you want to save money, change your internal talk tracks and justifications from any type of shopping “logic” resembling what’s below.

Common Black Friday Logic:

• That toaster is 70% off! Mine is getting old (even though it works) so I might as well get that for me (replace toaster with whatever random gidgetadoo you end up buying that you didn’t originally plan on buying)
• Well most of this is for other people for Christmas/Hanukkah/birthdays
• That TV/hair curler/headphones/etc is 40% off so I’m actually ‘saving money’ (if money leaves your wallet/bank account, you are LOSING money…you just lost less than you would have)
• This thingamawidget NEVER goes on sale and now it is so therefore I must get it now (even though I’ve been fine without all this time)!

Better Black Friday Logic:

• Little Lucy has that doll on her Christmas list and it’s on sale. Since I was going to get it anyway, I’ll buy it today at a cheaper price!
• Our wizzamoboolit broke last month and we need a new one! I see Target has wizzamoboolit’s on sale for Black Monday! That’s something we need and we are getting a deal. Woohoo!
• I had $300 budgeted for Black Friday and Cyber Monday so that’s all I’m spending (someone hide my wallet from me for the next 3 days!)
• I had $300 budgeted for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, but instead, I’m just going to spend $100 of it and invest the other $200 into Target’s stock which pays a 3.71% dividend yield! (Okay so few of you will actually ever do this, but damn you’ll be a millionaire quicker if you think like this regularly)

Rule #2 – Have a Black Friday/Cyber Monday budget and plan

I’ve partook my fair share of Black Fridays. Back when I had a poor mindset around time and money, I would camp out the night before to get in line for stuff that’s long been thrown away and replaced with more crap. Eventually, as I learned more about the value of money and considered how hours of my life I spent earning that, I began to be more thoughtful about how much I spent. I started taking out cash for Black Friday and leaving my wallet at home so I woudn’t overspend. I went into stores with a list and knew exactly what I was going to get. I ended up buying less crap, spending less money and kept the things I purchased longer.

It seems the best deals aren’t even offered on Black Friday this year, but the day before...a day we ironically call Thanksgiving. Now I’m not trying to completely discourage people from this upcoming weekend’s deals or talk bad of people who partake in the hyper-consumerism of the day. I’ll be the first one to admit I’ve had my fair shares of elbows to the face and kicked a few kids out of the way to get to the newest PS4 game that was $20 off during the madness of shopping. But family is important to me and Thanksgiving is usually a big reunion for us. So it’s not surprising that my lost zeal for this weekend correlated when the first stores started opening on Thanksgiving a few years ago.

Now, the transition for the part on how to get more on this weekend.

This is not going to be what you probably thought it was about. It’s not about getting more stuff. There’s plenty of other websites and articles for that. It’s about getting more out of life. Hopefully, you can recognize my mix of sarcasm and sad truth in this post of what this day/weekend really has become for so many. Last year, just on Black Friday (not including Thanksgiving sales, Sat-Sun offers or Cyber Monday), people in the US spent over $5.03 billion dollars. In one day! The Marketing Machine is working overtime this time of year to incentive you to get in the stores (whether physically, online or both preferably) to spend as much money as possible. And they’re doing a great job at it as spending is projected to increase this weekend by over $30 billion dollars!!! That’s a lot of Tickle-Me Elmos.

Remember this. You get one go at this life. Is spending less time with family and friends on Thanksgiving and forcing others to have to work on a holiday (mostly for around minimum wage) really worth it? Is it worth giving up arguing about politics, talking about old flings, making fun of each other and reflecting around the fire on things that we actually are grateful for? For what? So we can get started 6 hours earlier on something we were going to do on our Friday off anyway? We were better off keeping Thanksgiving sacred and saving our money. And before you cold me old-fashioned or an old man (I’m 31), just know that science and data back me up on this.

Don’t believe me? Here’s a few numbers around shopping regrets and habits for Black Friday.

• 52% of people buy something on Black Friday they regret buying
• Men spend more on average than women do (Men – $626 vs Women – $342)
• Men are more likely to regret a purchase than women (58% vs 48%)
• 12% of people buy something that they later realize they already have at home
• People with full-time jobs plan to spend an average of $745 this weekend
• People from Wisconsin, Texas and New York are projected to spend the most

I leave you with this. Build a list of what you need/want. Make a budget for it. THEN, take some time to really consider the things you have, the health you and your family are in (no matter how good or bad it is, you are here). Remember the family and friends that you’ve lost and won’t joining you at the dinner table this year. Look around at the things you do have and count your material blessings. Then, re-look at your list and make sure you truly need/want the things on there. And if so, go and get those chingamabobs and whatsagidgets and enjoy them with the people you love!