Well folks, 2013 is the year. The year that Black Friday officially invades Thanksgiving . We all knew it was coming sooner or later.
In what is almost certainly certain to signal a chain reaction of similar initiatives throughout the country, New Jersey’s Rockaway Townsquare Mall has bitten the bullet and become the first (so far as we know) retail body to open for Black Friday deals on Thanksgiving Day.
This isn’t like last year when you could take a nap for a few hours before waking up at 10PM to head out to the mall. This year, you practically have to be out the door by the time the turkey is out of the oven . Rockaway Townsquare will open all stores at 8PM Thanksgiving Day, and won’t close until 10PM Black Friday.
That’s a 26 hour marathon. Black Friday is such a super day that it gets two hours more than the standard day.
A memo from Rockaway Townsquare management makes it look like there isn’t much room for negotiation. It encourages store managers to start planning their schedules now, and, “as a friendly reminder all tenants are expected to follow the holiday schedule.”
So basically, this is happening. I would love to say “you could just not go,” but we all know we’re going to go. Next year, Thanksgiving dinner will become Thanksgiving mid-afternoon snack. The following year, it will be Thanksgiving lunch. The following year, Thanksgiving brunch. Then Thanksgiving breakfast.
A few years down the road from there, and the only thing we’ll be thankful for is 48 straight hours of Black Friday shopping!
Behold the horror of the Rockaway Townsquare Mall memo below, and let us know if this Black Friday thing is getting a little out of hand.
[Image: Shutterstock, h/t: Gawker ]