Black Friday Gameplan {Series} Day 3

Welcome to Day 3 of my Black Friday Gameplan series!
(Better late than never right?)

If you missed the first two days, they are here: Day 1   Day 2

ONLINE SHOPPING and 
WATCHING FOR PRE-BLACK FRIDAY SALES

We are going to take a little bit of an anti-Black Friday stance today.  Mainly because many products and companies have great sale opportunities surrounding the week of Black Friday.  So let's explore those options, shall we?

Although Black Friday has stellar deals, do you know that some of those deals can be found NOW?  Through different online websites, there are already deep deep discounts to be found.  My favorite places to find these discounts are at a number of "daily deal" type of websites.  You have to keep an open mind on some of them!  

For example, perhaps you never considered getting a wine sampler for your sister and brother-in-law, but there is a daily deal that gives them 6 bottles for $20!  If they like wine, AT ALL, that could prove to be a nice, unique gift.

Here are some of my most favorite daily deal websites*:
Mamasource
GroopDealz
EverSave
PlumDistrict
LivingSocial
And with all of these daily deal websites, make sure you "look around" at deals other than the ones JUST in your subscribed area.  Many times other areas will have online deals that you can redeem from any place you live!

What about a gift that keeps on giving?  Long gone are the "Fruit of the Month" clubs, because concept has been updated with several new, hip monthly clubs.  We personally subscribe to some of the ones below (and love them!) and I have listed several more I have my eye on getting a chance to try!  For $30 you can give a gift to a child, man, or woman that keeps arriving into 2012.  And let's be honest, who DOESN"T love to get a fun treat in the mail?  Use your F.R.A.N.K. list from yesterday to determine where this type of gift might fit in your BFG.
Birchbox
HisBlackBox
ShoeDazzle
BabbaBox
Little Passports

Lastly, watch for Pre-black Friday sales (They can sometimes be BETTER!!)--both in store and online.  

Some in store deals I was able to score on toys from weekly sales flyers recently will BEAT the Black Friday sale price!  
(And save me milage and gas in my car!)

Online, many retailers begin their Black Friday sales on Thanksgiving Day!  While my kids are watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, I am reading emails I have already received advertising Black Friday pricing! I can shop from home (in my PJ's with my hot coffee) and will not have to get to the store on Friday morning!  Obviously, many "doorbuster" offers are in-store only, but I have shopped from retailers such as Gymboree, Crazy8, Gapkids and Children's Place on Thanksgiving day during their Pre-Black Friday sales.  
That works for me!

And don't forget to sign up for places like these to save even more money when shopping online:

• Swagbucks--search EVERYTHING you do online (instead of just using your bookmarks) and you earn Swagbucks for searching.  Fill out surveys, take polls and other things to earn more swag bucks then redeem your swag bucks for gift cards and MORE in the Swagstore!  I earned enough Swagbucks in just a couple of months to get a $45 Amazon.com gift card!
• Ebates.com--Start all of your online shopping through Ebates to earn cash back as you shop!
• Shopathome.com--similar to Ebates, but they also have coupons and more! I love the special offers!

Come back tomorrow for another freebie to help organize your BFG and help you structure a gift list based on the store ads!

*Disclosure: Some links listed above are referral links.  All opinions are my own and I do not endorse anything I do not fully support and/or use myself.