Black Friday Watch: Best Buy Is Stupid
Posted on 17. Nov, 2010 by The Gimcracker in Black Friday Watch, Seriously?!
I guess you already know Best Buy is stupid, you don’t need TGM to tell you that. I mean have you ever gone into a Best Buy? It’s a bunch of kids dressed in blue polos who think they’re too good for their customers, but they actually don’t know anything about the products they sell. It’s a big box store. A grocery store for electronics. Yet, why do I always find myself wanting to go there? I can tell you, that desire has been waning of late. Take their latest weekly ad, for example. It’s so blatant an attempt to please everyone, that it pleases no one, and it makes me sick:
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I could really dissect this thing. Is the biggest news in the tech world truly WHITE cell phones? And let’s count all of the advertising they are cramming down our throats on just this one page: Verizon, AT&T, Android, Dell, Sony, Samsung, Facebook, YouTube, and Taylor Swift. Yes, we could go on and on ripping this apart. But I want to focus on the footer of the ad. Did you notice it?
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Eid al-Adha is a Muslim holiday that has absolutely nothing to do with Christmas. I have nothing against Muslims being able to celebrate their own holidays, but why in the name of all that is sacred is Best Buy telling me “Happy Eid al-Adha”? What does that have to do with flat-panel TVs and Xboxs? I didn’t see anything in the Wikipedia article about Eid al-Adha being a holiday of buying each other consumer electronics.
Also, why does it say Merry Christmas right next to it? Did I miss something? Did Christmas move from December 25th to November 15th? Wouldn’t you feel silly if you walked around on November 15th saying “Merry Christmas” to your coworkers? There are yet four additional holidays to the right of Merry Christmas. What’s happened here is that Best Buy has seen how much it can capitalize off of Christmas, and it has decided to rake its hand across the religious realm gathering all major holidays it can find within 2 months of Christmas. Then it puts “Happy ______” or “Merry _______” or “Feliz _______” on the front of its ad so more people will come buy stuff.
The funniest part about this is any other time of year Best Buy couldn’t give two sh*ts about Islam or Judaism. It’s only during Christmastime that the dollar signs appear in retailers’ eyes and they start spouting out salutations in 5 languages to show how much they “care” about other cultures. In my opinion, it’s actually kind of offensive that they even put Merry Christmas right next to Happy Eid al-Adha, seeing as how the holy book of the latter instructs its followers to subdue and/or kill the followers of the former. Do they really belong right next to each other?
Seriously, Best Buy?!
In an attempt to please everyone, Best Buy actually risks alienating it’s customers. If I want to buy a gift this year that I could have gotten at Best Buy, I am going to go to a different retailer that is not so offensive to me – if I can find one. Hello, Internet.