Black Friday Shoppers Hit Best Buy Early Thursday Night

By 9:30 p.m. Thursday a line of people continued to grow longer and it spilled well into the parking lot behind the Best Buy building located at 2710 South Green Bay Road.

While the store wouldn't be open until midnight, those in the front of the line had been waiting since Wednesday morning. Some of those in line brought chairs, and blankets. Some sat up against the side of the building reading store fliers, and clutching cups of coffee. Near by a group of boys played hacky sack.

They all waited for Black Friday to begin. And many were there for the sole purpose of buying a television, but not just any television -- a Toshiba 40-inch 1080p LCD flat screen that Best Buy was selling for $179. Normally, they sold for $419.99.

Izaac Payan, Gabriel Bernal and Brinelle Nabors were among the first in line waiting to buy the television. They had two tents and had camped out in front the store since Wednesday, but by 9:30 p.m. they ended up taking them down.

"It's crunch time," Bernal said. "We're getting ready to pop off here and buy some televisions."

Last year Bernal was 13th in line and Nabors was 15th in line, but they didn't get a television last year because the store only had a few. Disappointed, Bernal wasn't going to let that happen again.

"This year I'm first in line and I'm going to make sure I get one," Bernal said. "But this year I'm also getting a laptop, and a Blue Ray...and I'm sitting comfortably right now."

Nabors said he plans for weeks by paying attention to Black Friday store leaks.

"And I get it all done on Friday," he said.

Caledonia resident Duane Michalski said this was his seventh year shopping on Black Friday as he also hoped to buy a television for a friend of his that really didn't like shopping on the busiest retail-shopping day of the year.

"It's tradition," he said.

But not all of the people standing in line were as optimistic.

Racine resident Heather Schultz and her mother Nancy, of Woodbury Minnesota, stood at the end of the line. The two had decided to venture out on a whim in the hopes of snagging the 40-inch flat screen.

"I think we've got a 50/50 shot," Heather says.

"But I think you've gotta have an open mind when you are doing this kind of stuff," Nancy says.