Retailers plan for a safe Black Friday

Black Friday at Best Buy

After years of whipping shoppers into a frenzy with predawn doorbuster deals, US merchants are hoping that this year the bargain-hunting hordes will chill a little.

Seeking to avoid a repeat of the tragedy last Black Friday when a mob of shoppers trampled a temporary worker to death at a Long Island Wal-Mart, the National Retail Federation (NRF) and the US government are urging retailers to take measures to control the mad crowds. The US Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has published a fact sheet providing crowd control guidelines for retailers to protect their workers during major sales events. The OSHA tips include:

• Having trained security, crowd control personnel, or police officers on site
• Erecting barricades or rope lines for crowd management
• Issuing numbered wrist bands or tickets to provide first-come-first-served service
• Locating shopping carts and other potential obstacles or projectiles inside the store, away from the entrance
• Using bullhorns to manage and communicate with the crowd
• Consider holding an Internet lottery for “hot” items

OSHA’s move beyond its traditional purview regulating manufacturing, mining, and other perilous occupations demonstrates how competitive and dangerous (some would say sick), holiday bargain hunting has become. The NRF also issued Crowd Management Guidelines for its members this month and Wal-Mart has drawn up a Post-Thanksgiving Day Event Plan for crowd control at its 800-plus US superstores. To avoid the intense crush, Wal-Mart is keeping most of its stores open around the clock on Thanksgiving  — so you can skip dessert and head straight to the strip mall —  to spread out shoppers’ visits. (In-store specials will still start at 5am.) Wal-Mart’s plan also addresses entry to its superstores and traffic flow once inside.

Hopefully these measures, coupled with some self-restraint and a bit of perspective from shoppers, will prevent injuries and another death. Also, I would argue that the media deserves some of the blame for past retail mayhem by covering the Black Friday shopping scene like a competitive sporting event. Responsible coverage by local TV news can play a role in making Black Friday more civil and safe by sparing viewers blow-by-blow interviews with pumped up, rabid shoppers and encouraging people to leave the safety of their beds to do predawn battle.

If the 2009 shopping season is anything like last year, the best deals may not even be available this November 27. If holiday sales are weak, retailers may slash prices much closer to the Christmas holiday in a bid to spur sales. (Indeed, the NRF is forecasting a 1% decline in 2009 holiday sales.) So consumers — even hard-core bargain hunters — might do just as well by sleeping in on Friday.

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Photo by T. Shein, used under a Creative Commons license.