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Subscribe to RSSBlack Friday starts at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving day and retailers expect to ring up as much as 20 percent of their holiday sales over the Thanksgiving weekend. CNBC's Courtney Reagan reports.
Target employees are seeing red after the retailer announced its stores will open at 9 p.m. on Thanksgiving night, cutting into holiday time for workers. An online petition asking Target to not open on Thanksgiving has over 179,000 signatures, and the number continues to rise.
Thanksgiving, a time for family, togetherness, turkey ... and standing for hours to service the needs of the relentless hordes of shoppers seeking the last Furby and deeply discounted HDTV sets. Indeed, Black Friday, which traditionally started in the pre-dawn hours of Friday, has seen its hours pushed back in recent years so that stores start offering savings on Thanksgiving night itself.
This year, Walmart, Toys R Us, Kmart, and Sears are all opening their doors at 8 pm Thursday. Together with Target, that's two to four hours before they kicked things off last year.
A Target worker started an online petition calling on the retailer to not move Black Friday to Thursday. In a few days the petition gathered nearly 200,000 signatures. NBC's Diana Alvear reports.
Reached for comment, Target spokesperson Molly Snyder told NBC News: "Target’s opening time was carefully evaluated with our guests, team and the business in mind. Across the country, team member preferences were considered in creating our store staffing schedules. Thanksgiving weekend is one of the busiest of the year, and we appreciate our Target team’s flexibility on this weekend and throughout the holiday season."
Synder told NBC News that Target employees always receive time-and-a-half pay for working national holidays. Workers clocking hours during Thanksgiving and Black Friday also receive additional pay bonuses, she said. Only one-third of Target's workforce is scheduled to work on Thanksgiving.
Some employees are "excited" for the chance to work extra hours, she said. "We’ve heard from many stores that they had more team members volunteer to work than they had available shifts," Snyder said.
Not everyone is thrilled about stores being open on Thanksgiving, with Casey St. Clair, a Target employee, and Stacey Widlitz, S.W. Retail Advisors.
But there are a few people out there, almost 200,000, who think that something with "Friday" in the name should actually start on Friday.
The Change.org user who created the petition, "C. Renee," is a self-described six-year employee of Target living in California. In the petition description the user wrote that having to work on Black Friday prevented him or her from visiting their family on the East Coast.
C. Renee wrote, "I currently work two jobs, substitute teaching and work Target at nights and weekends, so having Thanksgiving off really does give me that one day to relax and visit family I otherwise have no time to see." The user did not respond to an NBC News request for additional comment.
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We have decided to do all of our Xmas shopping this year at local stores. We may have to spend a little more, but I would like to simply support the local mom and pop businesses.
You work retail suck it up and deal with it the holiday shopping frenzy is nothing new.
Why single out Target? They ALL do it! The boycott should have started two or three years ago when stores started opening at 3 or 4 am. If customers would simply stay away, the stores will return to the normal insanity of opening Friday at 6am.
Where I live, people said they were against stores opening at midnight but they were sure lined up outside Target, Kohl's and Toys r Us when the doors opened!
Big Corporation continued pursuit of the almighty dollar.
It will be interesting to see how many non-free thinking, brainwashed, idiots there will be at the stores, staggering around with their blinders on.
Who's at fault? Big Corp or staggering idiots?
I figure it will be a tied score between big corp and the idiots by the end of the 4th quarter.
Have fun. My family and I will be home sharing quality family time together.
You'd have to have your head examined to go shopping on Thanksgiving night, or Black Friday for that matter. If buying a load of garbage for the holidays is that important to you, then you have other issues. Ooh, I got a crappy LCD tv for $300! And a scarf for five bucks!
Why are those greedy owners opening early.....because those greedy shoppers want to buy their product at those times. If people think this is so bad, then don't shop there during the new hours....those greedy owners will not want to open next year if they find there is no profit this year. For those poor workers....if you don't like the way management treats you, then find another job. If you can't find another job, then understand that the greedy owners of the company you can't get a job with didn't make enough profit to need you. If you keep it up, maybe Target won't make enough profit to need you either. Be thankful you have a job....I'm sure someone else would be more than happy to take yours.
Hire me! I can ignore customers for 8 hours and not think twice about it :-)
Blood from a turnip .....
All these retailers are locked in competition for market share. They have hired many temp employees who will likely be those most impacted by these extended hours. If customers did not come out to shop, you would not see the retailers spend the money to open with extended hours.
So much for family values.
The flaw in this story is that not everyone on the petition mentioned is a Target employee. The petition is misleading on its face and convinced me to sign and I AM NOT A TARGET EMPLOYEE AND NEVER HAVE BEEN. THIS AND OTHER PETITIONS PRESENTED TO ME FROM CHANGE.ORG HAVE LEAD ME TO OPT OUT OF THEIR EMAILS.
My family loves Thanksgiving! We have always celebrated with as many members getting together as can possibly make it. Everyone contributes something to the day and to the meal. There is absolutely no pressure to out-perform anyone else and no gifts are exchanged, compared or evaluated - the opposite of Christmas which is why we don't usually celebrate that holiday except in our own little nuclear families. Thanksgiving has become what Christmas was supposed to be. I wonder how long it will take for corporate America to just turn it into one big day long blow out sale?
Yeah, I don't really see the big deal here. It's offensive to our sensibilities, but if you're an employee, you more than likely don't mind the extra hours and extra pay. When I worked retail back in the day, I would volunteer to work on Thanksgiving for that reason. The store closed at a reasonable hour and I went home and ate and visited with family. Correct me if I'm wrong, but those who don't want to work can simply request the day off formally or informally - this includes the lady who started the petition. What would be wrong with her asking her boss to not schedule her for that day so she could visit family??? People are so whiny.
You are not allowed to request time off between approx a few days before black friday - january 5th. So yes you are wrong.
How many CEOs of these companies are working on Thanksgiving???? That's right, probably ZERO! And they expect their workers to miss Thanksgiving and spend it working the graveyard shift for a few bucks an hour more????
Give these workers a break, waiting a few hours wont kill these pathetic Black Friday shoppers!
My sincere sympathies but that's exactly where they want us ... scared, nervous, out of work and bent over with our butts up in the air. It's all about the GREED.
You think these CEOs of these corporations care about their workers? LOL
They only care about the bottom line and family time means nothing to them
I really do not see the big deal here. I used to work retail and they usually ask for volunteers first. For time and a half AND a holiday pay bonus they don't have to ask twice. Like it stated in the story most stores have more volunteers than slots.
My husband spent two Thanksgivings in row in Iraq when his tour was extended, we survived. You just do it another day. Thanksgiving isn't the only day you can get together as a family. If it is important to you, a way will be found.
They should be THANKFUL that they have a job.
My place of work is open 24 hours a day 7 days a wek 365 days a year.it realy comes down to IF YOU DONT LIKE IT GO FIND ANOTHER JOB, otherwise get a straw and suck it up
If you don't like it. Don't shop until Friday.........but you might miss all those great "deals"! Suckers
How is it that EVERY issue is caused by the 'greedy' business owner.
You people complain if companies lay people off, then the next article, you complain because people actually have to WORK.
I bet 80% of the complainers here voted for Obama, so you don't even think there should be a Christmas, but you will surely want that day off too.
If you don't want to work on Thanksgiving go get a job at someplace that isn't open on Thanksgiving.
After a heavy Thanksgiving meal, the idea of walking around shopping with the family has its appeal. Especially when compared to sitting at home trying to stay awake, making conversation and yawning over a football game.
Which brings up a point already mentioned -- the football players, coaches, concessionaires, TV crew all have to WORK on Thanksgiving. Somehow they get in some family time. Is anyone complaining about that?
Well, duh of course not. It simply isn't Thanksgiving without football!
I worked at Target a number of years ago. They are not flexible. Part-time employees did not receive holiday pay or bonuses for working Black Friday. Maybe the people at Corp. did.... but not the people working in the stores. I personally feel that the country needs to go back to some older values where EVERYTHING was closed on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
1) Target thinks it's a business necessity 2) No law says you have to work there, so 3) quit whining. And, customers, no law says you have to go stand in line. If enough of you don't that it becomes not worth it to open that early, they won't. Yeah, it sucks that my wife has to work Thanksgiving evening, but OTOH she will be off Christmas Eve for the first time in the 13 years she's worked at Target.
The doors will open, but the sales won't start when the doors open. I work a part-time (2nd) job as a security guard. We have covered the WalMart stores and even though the doors were open Thanksgiving day, the Black Friday sales didn't start until mid-night. But it was wall to wall people, no room to move, and those that came even though they were sick, crammed into what little aisle space there was waiting for their particular sale item. They cough all over you, their babies and small children are crushed in the crowds and screaming, all for the fact that they might save a buck. It would be freezing outside, and like an oven inside. The guards go home sick and tired after the frenzy causes fights, yelling and other arguments. It's not fun, it's hard work. The guards usually get to spend some time with family and friends, with eating early, then off to work for 12-13 hours cause the shift will start a minimum of 45 minutes before doors open, then you wait while the store fills up and you don't get off until after sunrise on Friday morning. The stores know what they are in for, so security must be on the premises. It's kind of trickle down.....
JC Penney decided not to open Thanskgiving night last year, and its sales was hammered. No one appreciated JC Penney did this, but everyone remembered the big loss JC Penney incurred last year for opening late (it is still in the news a year later). Every retailer learns from the painful experience of other retailers.
Online retailers are now the biggest competition against brick and mortar retailers. They will be open 24-hour on Thanksgiving vs after 8-9pm for brick and mortar stores. There isn't really much of a choice for Target, Sears or other brick and mortar retailers.
If you don't like the stores opening Thanksgiving night, then boycott and don't shop Thanksgiving night. I personally won't be doing any shopping on Thanksgiving day because it should be time to stay at home with family and friends. Unfortunately there will be many people who will be going to the stores that night, rendering any boycott useless.
Actually, all these stores have on-line shopping available as well. They can certainly compete with the Amazon's of the world, all they have to do is spin it better in their advertising. Perhaps, on-line only sales for Thursday night, with in-store pickup at your convenience the next day, or shipped to your door if you prefer. Advertise the hell out of that and let your people have Thursday with their families.
Of course, the whole point of offering a lot of cheap crap at below cost prices is to get you into the store in the hopes that you'll also impulse buy a lot of additional crappy items with double-keystone markups.
Most reasonable post I've read about why stores "have to" be open on Thanksgiving, and what we,the consumers, can do about it. Thanks.