Signs of a bad economy (?) II

It's Black Friday 2008

With a slumping economy, Black Friday 2008 not only promised to be the worst holiday season shopping day in recent history, but also see the biggest discounts across the board from Walmart to Macy's. Not so much so, say bargain hunters scouring the internet the night before readying for the raid. Real price slash are rare and free after rebate items are almost impossible to find. The most discounted items are almost always very limited in stock, only there to lure customers into the store.

On the day after Thanksgiving or what has come to be known as Black Friday - the day when accounting makes past the red - merchants traditionally kick off the holiday shopping season by opening their doors up to five hours earlier to compete for business. Just a few years back, deal seekers like myself would have to decide which store to show up at 5am for FAR items. But with rampant inflation in the last couple of years, many of those disguised as deals on the internet are only merchandises going at what they did just a few short years before.

But don't let the lack of price cuts fool you. I was at Fry's Electronics 10:30am this morning (instead of 5am because of lack of incentives) and reality paints a very different picture from the analysts' predictions. One after another, big screen TVs, laptops and other big boxes of high end consumer items sticking out of shopping carts filed through the registers. Traffic to the store was backed up and Fremont PD had to be called. The parking lot overflew and customers had to park across the street and walk over. Still at 11am, 6 hours after the store had opened, an unending stream of people would return to their cars with multiple backs of electronic products, an astonishing sight very different from just a few days ago.

Lower end stores such as Walmart have managed the momentum in attracting shoppers with everyday low prices. Target with its comedic shopping cart runner ad campaign did equally well. I was at Wells Fargo Bank today and was greeted with unusual hospitality probably because of the few number of customers. The ATMs were empty, not a typical Friday scene. Supermarkets also look very different from earlier this week, likely because everybody is stuck with left over the rest of the weekend.

If Fremont's shopping rush is any indication of the nation's economic state, it certainly brings hope to a what is supposed to be a belt-tightening holiday this year. But the San Francisco Bay Area is a far more affluent region than the rest of the US so we still have to wait and see. But I have a feeling when the sales are tallied and the books are closed, this will go down a pretty good Black Friday.

Reporting live from Fremont California.