BLUF: As you probably know, you aren’t saving ANY money on black friday. Base price is determined to be the “sale” price and then marked way up so that on sale days, they can say you “save” money.
Apply the idea of “bargain” hunting vs “every day low prices” to the firearm industry and you get interesting results. I just got, for example, American Shooters’ black friday ad. They’re a pretty legit gun store and range in Las Vegas. Their black friday prices weren’t much cheaper, if at all, than some other places’ every day price. But I bet they’ll make money hand over fist because it’s a “sale.”
I’ve worked in sales in various industries for 20 years. The margins in the gun industry are MUCH smaller than in any other industry I’ve seen. So while clothing stores, for example, can offer 40-70% off sales, gun stores don’t have anywhere near that margin to begin with. Keep in mind with overhead (utilities, rent, employees, credit card processing, etc.) not to mention replacement cost to reorder the same merchandise (and the employee cost to receive, stock, tag, and merchandise it) they don’t have much room to discount before they are losing money.
I flat out refuse to buy anything outside of basic necessities on Black Friday. I can not stand the corporate greed driven mass consumerism of that day.
I snapped up a couple pair of Oakleys at DSG thanks to their 40% off sale. Sunglasses I was going to buy anyway, so why not. If anyone has a decent BF deal on ammo I will order a couple cases, but again, that’s something I know I always need.
I won’t be out and about on Friday just because I can’t stand the idiots. I see no reason to subject myself to the masses to save a couple bucks. That said, I have been eyeballing a new TV and might pick one up online and have it shipped.