Black Friday Canada What Did YOU Buy?

Friday, November 23, 2012

Black Friday, although an American shopping event has recently been seen more and more prominent in Canada. Although the sales might not be as good as those north of border, every retailer takes the opportunity to display their promotions. We may not be lining up overnight at Target or pushing and shoving to get pre-paid cell phones at Walmart, but Canadians love their sales too, as witnessed by the swarms of Black Friday offers this year.

I spent the afternoon at the Toronto Eaton Centre, the crowds weren't horrible until about 5-6pm when people got off work. Every store had a promotion going on, some better than others. With the amounts of people at the mall you would think there were awesome promotions, but unless you have your heart set on something specific and went early (for me it was a jacket at Top Shop during their 50% off outerwear sale) the sales were average at best in my opinion.

Sephora was a store that I wanted to check out for Black Friday, they had a $12 One day wonder promotion. By the time that I got to the store all the good items were sold out. I heard the Sephora online Black Friday sale didn't go so well either, their website crashed apparently.

What I found interesting was amongst the crowds and crowds of shoppers at the Eaton Centre, outside of Sears there was a crowd of people meditating in a circle. I got a leaflet from one of the organizers, she explained to me how despite it being a popular shopping event they were celebrating Buy Nothing Day and choosing instead to not buy anything today. That the more material things we get, the more dissatisfied we become. Some of the looks/reactions they received from people were interesting to say the least.

What did you get this year for Black Friday? Did you go out hunting for deals at the shopping mall or did you opt to shop online instead or skipped it completely?