A Walmart shopper documented throngs of leftover Black Friday products at one of the retailer’s locations. Marketing enthusiast and TikToker Tay (@queentayshops) posted a viral video calling Walmart’s sales tactics into question.
Her clip, where she blasted the sales prices of items, accrued over 400,000 views as of Friday.
Left behind
“Y’all wanna see something funny?” Tay asks at the top of her video, which begins with her walking through a Walmart location. Her clip then transitions to her standing in front of orange bins. They are filled with large stuffed toys of popular characters from children’s programming. First up, is everyone’s favorite miserable Yuletide professional hater, The Grinch.
Next up in another bin is the beloved Australian Blue Heeler Bluey, wearing a Santa Clause hat. According to Tay, these items are leftovers from everyone’s favorite “scam” retailer sales holiday: Black Friday.
“The Black Friday stuff is still here, December 3rd. Everything. And it’s all like, halfway full,” she says, walking down the aisle to reveal even more bins filled with stuffies.
“This one is completely full,” she says, halting at a bin of Squishmallows. “The toys, which is the saddest part.”
Additional leftovers
However, it wasn’t just products designed for snuggles that were left over from Black Friday. Tay stops and records a bin filled with mats.
“Even the $4 rugs, the blankets, the towels,” she says. Following this, she ends up at a bin packed with bedding sets. “It looks like nobody bought these,” Tay remarks, commenting on the pile of products.
Afterward, she cuts back to another section of the show: A collection of boxed air fryers. “You can’t make this up. All of these Air Fryers…did anybody even get these?” she says of the $50 cookers.
Then, she records herself strolling past a 75-inch Vizio TV set. Its sale price? $478. As Tay continued to traverse the aisles of the store, it became apparent that there was still a lot of unsold Black Friday stock. Row after row of orange bins dotted the center of the store.
A lot of orange cardboard
“You think I’m just looking at a specific section,” she says. “It’s all the way down. Look at these.” She shows a $20 set of large utensils on a hanging display. “They just took the Black Friday tag off. They don’t even need to market it as a sale because it’s not that good of a deal,” she says.
Furthermore, she saw several holiday-themed Hello Kitty Christmas decorations standing on a shelf.
Tay says the products’ clear Black Friday abandonment is a bad look for the retailer.
“As a marketing professional, even myself I have no idea what they’re gonna do to swing this,” she says. “‘Cause even compared to last year, my own vlogs that I do at Walmart would always give positive videos. When I tell you almost every comment under my Black Friday vlogs for Walmart and all these other big stores are, ‘Eww, we’re not going there. Those prices suck, no, I’m not buying.’”
She capped her clip off on a call to action from Walmart: “Something’s gotta change and I’m curious to see what the change will be.”
Black Friday disappointments
It’s not difficult to see why so many consumers have soured on the idea of spending their money during Black Friday. Countless social media posts on numerous platforms have called out retailers for the illusion of post-Thanksgiving sales. One Target shopper called the chain out for misrepresenting the original sale price of its Black Friday offerings.
They revealed how some items had new sales stickers affixed to their tags. These past stickers showed numerous price adjustments prior to Black Friday. Meaning that the markdowns shoppers encountered during Black Friday were nothing special.
Furthermore, Target became the subject of even more Black Friday scrutiny after a shopper posted this video. In the clip, they showed off leftovers from the sale that were marked down even further. So if consumers know that Black Friday won’t offer a bottom dollar price, why not hold out a bit more and save money?
@queentayshops yall stood on business 😳 thats crazy!! #walmart #blackfriday #blackfriday2024 #inflation #sales ♬ original sound – Queen Tay | thrifty finds
TikTokers are over it
Several folks who commented on Tay’s video remarked they had zero interest in Black Friday. One TikToker shared the extent of their shopping during the retail holiday, writing, “I bought $6 pillows (Two 2-packs) and two $6 pajamas for my kids. That’s it. Black friday deals aren’t even deals anymore!”
Someone else remarked that the air fryer featured in Tay’s video actually cost less before Black Friday. “That same airfryer was like $35 a week before lol,” they claimed.
For another, the state of America’s economy was enough to keep her away from shopping. “We can’t afford Black Friday. I have an electric bill due that’s the size of my mortgage and only buying the necessities,” they said.
One TikTok user said Walmart doesn’t provide the value they’d expect on everyday necessities. “Walmart isn’t even a good deal on normal things we need. The fact that I spent $177 on things that we needed. And I could carry it all inside in one trip makes me want to cry,” they wrote.
The Daily Dot has reached out to Walmart and Tay via email for further comment.
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