Walmart Black Friday crowds and chaos are a thing of the past

Walmart employees say they're happy that the retailer now spreads holiday sales over weeks leading up to Black Friday.

• Black Friday as we know it is dead at Walmart, current and former employees say.
• Sales are spread over multiple weeks, and shoppers are going online to snag deals instead of lining up outside a store.
• That's a welcome change for Walmart associates, who say they they don't miss the one-day shopping crush.

It used to be a ritual: Shoppers lined up as early as Thanksgiving Day outside Walmart and navigated literal mazes just to score a deal on a flat-screen television or a $4 crock pot.

Former Walmart employee Karen Baker told Business Insider she worked each Black Friday in her decade with the company and described it as a "free for all."

Once, in 2012, throngs of 3 a.m. shoppers rushed Baker as she was cutting shrink-wrap from a video game display, she said.

"I was shoved so hard up against there that I couldn't even bend down to cut it," she said. A coworker noticed Baker was trapped, grabbed her arm, and pulled her to safety.

At the nation's largest physical retailer, though, those chaotic days may be a thing of the past.

One current and two former Walmart employees told Business Insider that stores in recent years aren't bracing for chaos on the day after Thanksgiving. If anything, they're expecting foot traffic to be not much busier than another holiday weekend.

Indeed, retail foot traffic data from Placer.ai shows this year's holiday shopping season is shaping up to be another extended, lower-key affair like the last few years have been.

"It was just like a normal shift," said Athenia Camacho, who worked for the company in 2021. "There was a lot of lines and a lot of people, but normal other than that."

The pandemic dealt a blow to Black Friday in stores, and it hasn't come back

2020 marked the death of Black Friday as we know it, when public health measures during the pandemic kept many shoppers away from crowds and glued to their screens.

But even as normalcy has returned, fewer customers seem eager to rush Walmart on what used to be the official start of the holiday shopping season, the current and former employees said. Last year, Black Friday traffic at Walmart's stores actually fell 5.3% over 2021 despite the end of mask mandates and other early-pandemic requirements.

Instead, shoppers are spreading their spending over a few weeks, starting in October, when Walmart and other retailers offer a series of online and in-store sales.

"The Friday after Thanksgiving is a non-event," said one associate at a Walmart store in the Southwest. Business Insider granted the source anonymity as they are not authorized to speak to the media.

Instead of one day of sales, Walmart now offers a series of items on mark-down, from pajamas to electronics. "Black Friday" sales now start weeks before Thanksgiving.

Camacho did say that some deals still get held back for the big day, but Baker pointed out that bargain versions of some merchandise are special-ordered for the sale.

"It's made just for Black Friday," Baker said of on-sale products that might otherwise appear similar to regularly available merchandise. "To make it cheaper to have the deal, it's not always the best, especially when it comes to clothing."

A Walmart spokesperson confirmed that the company sources "special buy options" for the sale, saying it is "one way we offer excitement and incredible prices to our customers."

'We just don't do Black Fridays.'

This year marks the fourth consecutive year that Walmart will close its stores entirely on Thanksgiving — a stark departure from less than a decade ago, when the retailer offered Black Friday deals that started at 12:01 am on Thanksgiving Day.

Before 2020, Baker said nobody was allowed to take Thanksgiving off for any reason, and for the current Walmart employee, it's a welcome change. Walmart did not respond to Business Insider's request for comment on mandatory holiday shifts.

"We all like it because we don't have that craziness to deal with," the associate in the Southwest told Insider. "And our sales are increased over three weeks instead of one crazy day when the store is destroyed."

Even though Baker still regularly shops at Walmart, she said she has no interest in the post-Thanksgiving ritual.

"Because of my time at Walmart, because me and my husband both have done it, we just don't do Black Fridays," she said.

Are you a Walmart employee with a story idea to share? Reach out to these reporters at dreuter@businessinsider.com and abitter@businessinsider.com