In a video posted on X, Walmart’s EVP, President and CEO John Furner announced that Walmart will be CLOSED on Thanksgiving for the fourth year in a row, continuing the tradition the retail giant started in 2020.
“Thanksgiving is such a special day during a very busy season,” Furner told Walmart associates in the video, adding that he was “delighted” to announce Walmart would stay closed on Nov. 23.
Walmart (along with most other major retailers) started closing for Thanksgiving in 2020. Given the pandemic, staying open and packing shoppers and employees into stores was not a good look.
Closing on Thanksgiving wasn’t always the norm. In the 2010s, retailers started pushing the envelope, opening earlier and earlier on Thanksgiving Day. It got to the point in 2019 where JCPenney opened 2 p.m. on Turkey Day and Walmart opened at 6 p.m.
The pandemic changed all that, and since then, no major big-box stores have dared to cross the line into opening on Thanksgiving. In fact, Target announced in 2021 it will never open on Thanksgiving again.
We were curious to see if retailers would start bucking the trend, but Walmart has made it clear, for this year at least, that Thanksgiving is off limits as a shopping day — in person anyway. Online, you’ll find plenty of Black Friday sales to shop. Shopping early? Be sure to activate our cash back offer and get 3% back when you shop Walmart online.
The post It’s Official: Walmart’s Staying Closed on Thanksgiving Again appeared first on The Real Deal by RetailMeNot.
