Sales have been down at Radio Shack, everyone in the tech industry seems to know that, everyone in consumer electronics seems to know that as well.

On Monday the struggling company announced that they would start their holiday shopping season at 8am on Thanksgiving Day. No, not Black Friday, and not just a few hours early on Thanksgiving, yes some poor Radio Shack employees will miss out on Thanksgiving all together, because it’s impossible for the hobbyist retailer to be taken seriously in the days of Best Buy and HH Gregg.

“Given the customer demand for store hours on Thanksgiving last year, we made the decision to open on Thanksgiving,” RadioShack spokeswoman Andrea McCauley said. “It gives us the opportunity to stay competitive.” “Given the customer demand for store hours on Thanksgiving last year, we made the decision to open on Thanksgiving,” RadioShack spokeswoman Andrea McCauley said. “It gives us the opportunity to stay competitive.”  NBC News Reported. 

“Black Friday” called that because it’s the day most retailers go from red to black, is traditionally the Friday after Thanksgiving. Most companies give their employees off both Thursday and Friday and it’s a tradition that dates back to the 1930’s with parades sponsored by department stores marking the start of the holiday shopping season.

For decades stores would open at 6am on that Friday morning, with lines mounting all night long. Through the 90’s Black Friday shopping started a trend of kicking off earlier and earlier in the morning on that Friday. In 2010 Toys R Us started their Black Friday shopping sales at 10pm which started a trend of starting earlier and earlier.

Some are worried that Radio Shack’s efforts may quite simply because they can’t do the volume discounting major chains like Best Buy and HH Gregg can do.