November 13th, 2008
Best Buy Black Friday ad leaks. Don't get too excited. get too excited.
While Circuit City has pretty much crashed and burned, Best Buy has chugged merrily along. But the electronics retailing giant has just made a pessimistic forecast of its year-end earnings, which led many to think its Black Friday special were going to be something special. Well, the Best Buy Black Friday ad has finally leaked—and it’s probably not going to make you dash over to line up after Thanksgiving dinner if you’re looking for incredible HDTV values.
One particularly good deal (one of the doorbuster items) would seem to be a 50-inch Panasonic 720p plasma for $899, except you can already buy a 50-inch Panasonic 720p plasma (TH-50PX80U) for $949 at J & R Electronics. Other deals are also decent, if not overwhelming. For instance, the $799 Samsung LN-40A500 is a good price for a 40-inch 1080p LCD, though Sears had a deal for the set at the same price last month. The $999.99 Mitsubishi WD-60735 60-inch DLP HDTV is $100 less than the lower price online for the set today; the $699.99 price for the Samsung PN-42A400 42-inch 720p plasma is the same as Kmart is offering on Black Friday. Click to see the full list of HDTV deals in the Best Buy Black Friday ad.
Amazingly, Circuit City has declared for bankruptcy, and yet its Black Friday ad hasn’t leaked. Maybe it will offer some fantastic deals. (By all logic, it should.) But if you can hold off until after the holidays, when HDTV sales are normally flat, the price-cutting could get to desperation levels. I can hardly wait.
Sean Portnoy spent several years as an editor at Computer Shopper magazine, most recently serving as online executive editor. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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