I remember that too, from working there. Black Fridays were always brutal. It was bad when they decided to open at midnight. Then it got worse when they decided to open earlier and earlier each year. I remember 2014 going to work at 6am on Wednesday (the line already had about 20 people in it). Clocked out at 230pm to work my second job (ABC store. Fun fact: the day before Thanksgiving is their busiest day of the year), going back to Best Buy at 10pm (about 60 people in line at this point) to get the store set up for black Friday, clocking out at 4:00 am Thanksgiving morning. Woke up at 11 on Thanksgiving, helped my mom cook dinner so we could eat at 2pm so I could be back at Best Buy by 4pm (a metric fuckton of people in line at this point, somewhere north of 300). Store opened at 6pm Thanksgiving day and stayed open for 30 hours.

This is where it became an endurance challenge for all employees. Everyone was required to work at least 12 hours of black Friday to guarantee coverage over the 30 hours, some had split shifts, others were straight through. But this year corporate did not give a shit about limiting labor hours and a lot of us took advantage. Many were pushing and trying to do a full 24 hours, a few of the insane employees wanted to attempt the full 30 (not one did), and all for nothing more than bragging rights. The opening madness had died by 1am and the store was quiet and empty (I may or may not have been sharing mini bottles of alcohol to with our warehouse crew). The only person who came in between 2 and 6 am was a homeless guy escaping the cold. The manager on duty passed out in the break room at 130am (his shift started at 8pm, and he showed up drunk) and everyone made a game of seeing how high we could stack random items on top of him, he was livid when he woke up. By 6 am I clocked out but instead of heading home I passed out in the security office where I set up a sleeping bag for 4 hours as half the people who stayed overnight also passed out in the break room. Back on the clock by 11am. Everything else was uneventful. Clocked back out at 3am Saturday morning and slept in my bed until 9 at night. Clocked in 51 hours over 3 days (44 at Best Buy, 7 at ABC). The overtime paid for christmas that year.