The Boxing Day Report

If Christmas is what is good about the Holidays, then Boxing Day is Hell. For the retail men and women slugging it out with the huge onslaught of hungry bargain hunters, you deserve a huge pat on the back for surviving. No one knows how much it both sucks and is exciting to work the day. This is only one of two times in the last ten years that I have not worked a Boxing Day. It’s so normal for me to go to bed early on Christmas Evening and wake up on Boxing Day at 5:00 AM to open up that I thought something went horribly wrong when I was still in bed at 10:00 AM.

When I was a retail employee, I hated working the day, but after the tenth hour passed by and it was time to go home, it really didn’t feel like that much time has passed. The day is like a blur. It’s also the only day of the year where I allowed my staff to work overtime, and no one seemed to mind. I always had donuts and coffee in the back just in case breaks had to be missed. I always have my best sleep of the season on boxing day evening. I’m so wiped that I just pass out as my girlfriend would return from her shopping.

This year, I told myself that I’d sleep in, and take my sweet time, and if I felt like it, I would go out and do a bit of boxing day shopping. I guess a lot of people had the same idea this year as the mall was still packed till about 4:00 PM in the afternoon. I was actually very surprised that many of the electronics stores were still filled.

I really didn’t see a whole lot that was truly interesting in any of the flyers. They were quite disappointing actually. Even though I’m no longer in retail, I still look through all the flyers and keep mental notes of pricing. It helps with my current job to keep up on those types of things so why not. Force of habit I guess. Most of the flyers had prices on alleged HOT items that had already been the same price or lower earlier in the year. I was most disappointed with the flyer that my old employer put out.

A couple of the items that had been on sale on LAST YEARS boxing day flyer returned from the dead for this year. Not good. I noticed that competitive items like the Xbox 360 bundle was priced way out of the ballpark by $50 over the closest competitor. Some discontinued floor standing speakers were the same price as current model ones from the same manufacturer across the street. What’s worse, the buyers screwed up and none of the stores got any. To add insult to injury, they were front page on the flyer. I’m so glad I was not there to deal with that public relations mess. I had noticed that the buyers had been screwing the pooch in the last couple years, and I think this year they finally hit rock bottom. There was nothing worth coming in for in that flyer when it came to electronics. I felt very sorry for the staff. If you have a hot flyer it is very easy to have a lot of fun. When you don’t, it’s a slow and painful day.

I used to love how customers would shop with invoices of products they purchased before Xmas in hand, thinking that the product they purchased would be substantially lower. In my experience, boxing day is a dumping ground for products that are normally NOT carried by the retailer during the year. That’s why they can sometimes be such a good deal. Anything that you bought earlier, unfortunately, was either cheaper during the Christmas Sales, or was the same price earlier in the year. If the reason you came at all was to see if you could get a price match after boxing day, I’d stay home. The lines, parking mess, and swarms of people milling around and getting in your walking space is not worth it.

I can safely say that the same seems to apply for sporting goods. After all, I worked in that industry too. If it’s an awesome deal, it will be something that was never carried during the year. It was probably brought in specifically for the sale. It’s also not likely that you’ll get a much better price on something you bought before boxing day, especially if you bought it when the store is pushing for the last week of sales before Xmas.

I’ve found exceptions to the rule in clothing stores though. There can be some really great deals to be had if you look. I saw a lot of 50 - 75% off signs on a lot of clothing. The only place that was a real waste of time for clothes was RW Co. Their boxing day sale was very misleading. They had sale signs all over the store, yet not one item was really cheaper than the days before the sale. If a store has sale signs and the staff tell you things are priced as marked, move on.

I definitely don’t miss working boxing day especially since I don’t have to anymore. I’ve put my time in and it’s time to punch out and move on. As a consumer, I’m also finding fewer and fewer reasons to be out there and have learned that the day after boxing day is actually better because you don’t have to deal with the chaos. If there was something I really wanted in a flyer, that wasn’t one of those very limited quantity things, I always found that I could still get what I wanted. Most importantly, I could do it at my own pace, in my own time. Plus, if you’re a smart shopper it’s more than likely you’ll get a deal equal to the ones that people are fighting over for those few hours, earlier in the year.