It took me a few minutes this morning to realize as I was checking my e-mail that the reason I had dozens of e-mails crowing about online discounts today was because today is the so-called Cyber Monday aka Black Friday for the internets.
I had a separate e-mail from each of the stores in The Gap chain: the namesake store, Old Navy, Banana Republic and the Piperlime online shoe site. Even though I didn’t see anything in The Gap or Old Navy on Friday that I liked or didn’t already own, I figured I’d scour the sites today since they were offering free shipping in addition to 10-20% off your purchase.
But when I logged on to The Gap’s site just a few minutes ago, I got the following message: “We’re updating our site to bring you a better shopping experience. Gap.com is temporarily closed for scheduled site improvements. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this may cause you.” Same message at the other four sites.
No, Gap. I’m sorry for the inconvenience it’s going to cause you that I’m not spending my money at your online store today, especially since I have no plans to buy any Christmas gifts from you anyway.
The Gap = Mega Fail o’ the Day Award.
I would assume that that was not scheduled, and in fact their sites are crashing. Any retailer would never schedule maintenance during the day, especially not on cyber monday.
Whoops. Just another chance for you to spend that money locally!
I got the same message! Probably for the best since I don’t need to be spending money on myself right now.