JCPenney Describes Sale as "Doorbuster!"

On November 28th a Walmart employee was killed when a crowd of Black Friday shoppers first busted through the doors and then trampled him. In light of this, I offer you the picture below. I took it at the JCPenney in Glendale, CA, last Wednesday:

There is something truly amazing here about how quickly we (collectively) forget, how callous we can be, the level of incompetence at JCPenney, or the plain ol' thoughtlessness that pervades contemporary American culture.

Crossposted at Sociological Images.

Comments

[abbie47]

06:05 PM on 12/30/2008

I'm surprised that nobody so far has agreed with Lisa here. It may not be the biggest issue out there, but a man died at a sale that was a literal "doorbuster." I think it's insensitive of Penney's to continue using these signs. Don't they have any other signs that just say "Huge Sale" or something?
People ran over a fellow human being just to get cheap stuff. I'm as big a sucker as anybody for cheap stuff, but wouldn't it be nice if we could be a little respectful of that Wal Mart employee that died and of his family?

[ruchild]

08:51 AM on 12/30/2008

When I worked at Penneys over 20 years ago, their sales are called doorbusters, so don't get all ugly on them for using a well-worn term that predates the ugliness of November, if you want to blame anyone, blame the economy for putting people into feeling they needed to be so base and dehumanizing. Oh and those doorbusters, not so great, buyer beware.

[Motherunit]

07:18 PM on 12/29/2008

Doorbuster is a common sale term. The tragedy at WalMart brought a cruel new twist to it this season, but hey, do you really think the suits who run Pennys gave it a moment's thought? They were probably jealous because WalMart got all that free publicity.

[Livvy]

12:12 AM on 12/29/2008

They have been calling big sales Doorbusters for years at J.C. Penneys and I doubt very much that anyone suddenly thought they needed to change it because of this unfortunate incident in the recent news. I would get your indignation if WalMart had written up a new ad campaign using something similar but a slogan that Penneys has used as long as I can remember seems perfectly acceptable to me.

[PatA]

06:17 PM on 12/28/2008

may i please gently suggest that you get a life. serve food to the homeless, volunteer at a nursing home or just stay home and have a nice glass of wine and chill.

[HighInfoVoter]

09:24 AM on 12/28/2008

The signs were designed months ago. Do you have any idea what it takes to change and redistribute signs to thousands of stores in a few days?

You'll be seeing this term at other retailers, too. Calm down. Don't live to be offended at everything.

[jokester]

06:36 AM on 12/28/2008

Lisa, take a breath - this is what BIG sales have been called for a long time. it implies that there are so many items on sale, it's 'busting the doors', not that shoppers are busting the doors to get to the sale.

[maying]

02:55 AM on 12/28/2008

they have always called special sales "doorbusters." it is not just a jcpenney thing. where have you been all these years????

[ctopherholland]

02:18 AM on 12/28/2008

oh, come on. "doorbuster" is what sales like that have always been called.

jcpenney has probably had that sign for years, and they probably just changed the dates on that paper under it.

if you're judging 'contemporary American culture' based on the competence of JCPenney employees, i'm worried.