Middletown's Early Black Friday Feast

Just hours after gobbling up parts of another unlucky bird, sleep-deprived early birds are expected to camp out in front of two local retail stores hoping to get  lucky.

And if any are like the sweatsuit-clad, pumped-up woman featured in  pre-Black Friday television advertising this week, they will be running a marathon through stores armed with a shopping cart to take advantage of the deals.

Following through on a mandate from their midwestern-based corporate offices, both and in Middletown will open at midnight tomorrow to welcome shoppers who supposedly can't wait to gobble up incredible holiday savings.

The midnight opening is the earliest ever in the nearly 50-year history of both national retailers according to the corporate web sites for each company.

If history is any indication, would-be customers will be camped out in front of both stores hours ahead of time waiting in line for either some hard-to-get, but must-have toy or electronic product.

Corporate spokespersons from both Target and Kohl's say online that they are armed and ready to meet the anticipated crowds.

Closer to home, the Middletown Township Police Department is ready as well to ensure that the stores' patrons behave before and after the doors open, according to Township Administrator Anthony Mercantante.

Police will be patrolling the parking lots of both Target and Kohl's, which are located about three miles apart on opposite sides of Route 35, for several hours on Thanksgiving before midnight, Mercantante said.

At least four officers have been assigned to Target, which sells more toys and electronics than Kohl's, to maintain crowd control and to head off any incidents between patrons, he said.

The store's corporate offices, rather than local taxpayers, pick up the township tab for the extra patrols, and the officers do not receive overtime for their assignments, Mercantante said.

"Target is pretty good about working with us," Mercantante said. "They also give back a lot to the community."

The payment arrangement is modeled after the agreement that utility companies have with local police departments to pay for traffic patrols when road crews are working in an area, he explained.

Last year, township police did arrest and charge one person outside of Target with disorderly conduct when that would-be patron got into a "scuffle" with another customer, Mercantante said.

While wary that incidents can happen, local police believe there presence in the parking lots will keep those camping out a message to stay in line.

"We believe that was just an isolated incident," Mercantante said.

Nationally, Target, which uses a bull's eye for its corporate logo, has been itself the target of protests by its own employees and some consumers for its midnight opening. The strike of twelve o'clock and Cinderella-like transformation of its workers from Thanksgiving revelers eating pumpkin pie to Target workers marks the earliest that the Minneapolis-based corporation has opened for Black Friday business since it came to be in 1962. 

As of Thanksgiving Day, nearly 200,000 people from throughout the U.S. had signed an online petition at change.org that was initiated by Target employee Anthony Hardwick of Omaha, Neb.

"Tell Target to Save Thanksgiving for families, not money," is the headline placed by supporters of Hardwick's online petition.

"Join me in calling for Target retail stores to push back their original opening time to 5 a.m. on Black Friday," Hardwick wrote on the site.

The midnight opening forces employees to leave their Thanksgiving dinner tables and their families early to report to work by 11 p.m., Hardwick wrote on the change.org petitioners' site. Besides depriving Target workers of a full-day off on Thanksgiving, the company mandate deprives its employees of a full-night sleep, he added.