Debunking Post-Holiday Shopping Myths

After finally getting my Wii and spending the past few days manically hooked on Wii Tennis and upping my all-time score to “professional,” I’ve decided that I now need to focus my energies on something a bit more tangible and likely to give equal amounts of attainable bliss: Shopping.

But…For those of you who know me, I hate shopping. I hate spending money. I hate crowds and I hate holidays that feed off of consumer greed and guilt. Now that the holiday season is officially over (well, the songs are off the radio anyways), and people are rushing back to stores to return and exchange gifts, I’ve decided to let a few days blow over, have some of the carte madness disperse a bit, and slowly get back out there and take advantage of some of these sales. In order to be successfully proactive in my shopping, I’ve decided to start with the essentials so as to eliminate all the unnecessary headache I usually attach to malls and people. Hopefully by me revealing the most common myths, you too can be enlightened and on your way to an even jollier 2008.

1) Myth # 1: Holiday season is over post-Christmas.
I lied in the previous paragraph when I said the holiday season was in fact officially over. If big name dept. stores like Kohl’s and Macy’s can be burning the midnight oil and opening at 6 AM the day after Christmas, you know there has to be an audience for this. Yeah and that audience would be the very same people that actually spend the day after Thanksgiving at strip malls, revving up on Starbucks lattes at 4 AM just to kick them out of that Tryptophan-state and anointing holiday-like status to a day of shopping. Canucks aside, who does that?

2) Myth # 2: Exhibit Kindness & Goodwill to Thy Neighbor
Ok, so this rule might apply to your literal neighbor, but don’t start getting all figurative on this one. If you see a Wii in Target or Best Buy, grab that puppy. Don’t do that polite thing when it comes to the things you want or you’ll never get anything in return - besides a lot of bitching and moaning when you come home empty-handed or realize you should have fought a little harder to stay in line to return that damn vase you have no use for but didn’t want to start rough-housing it with the old lady with the walker. Does she really need that walker is what you should really be asking yourself…

3) Myth # 3: People don’t like to Shop Online
Bullocks! Did you know that in England and Scotland, online sales pre-empted retail sales? Did you care?

4) Myth # 4: Giftcards are the Natural Remedy for a Fledgling Economy
Retailers are banking on giftcards pulling them out of this season’s sales slump? Yeah, good luck with that..

5) Myth # 5: Wii is Purely a State of Mii
And the most sought after product of the greed-fueled, consumer driven holiday season?

The Nintendo Wii was the most sought-after product, with the Transformers Ultimate Bumblebee a close second, according to Yahoo Shopping.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I got some Wii ass to cook.

Do Not Buy.com

I know that we don’t normally write about consumer issues in this blog. But I am so angry at this lousy web site, that I’ve decided to write my story.

I placed an order with Buy.com, it was a 3 user any- virus software for a very low price, when some time had passed and I still didn’t get the package, I tracked it on the UPS website and was surprised to find that it was already shipped. then I tried to contact Buy.com customer service, and I hate to say it, but sometimes you get what you pay for…The worst customer service ever. Shipped to the wrong address (I spoke to UPS and confirmed it) and then denied my claim saying that it was shipped to the right address. They don’t advertise their phone no. online, and when I finally managed to get a No. I waited over 30 minutes only to speak to someone who couldn’t give me any information regarding their claim department. She couldn’t even transfer me to the supervisor, because “She is too busy…”
So please be careful next time you want to buy from this site, they will take your money alright, but then you are all alone.

Parts of this post were also published on Yelp.