To meet Black Friday demands this year, GameStop is encouraging its employees to compete for extra Black Friday shifts by participating in the #redwinechallenge on TikTok. The company’s event team announced the challenge on October 28th when they posted a video of themselves doing the challenge.
Each store will send their best #redwinechallenge videos to marketing company Incisiv. The store with the best video will receive an Amazon Echo 8, an Echo Auto, and a $100 Visa gift card along with “10 additional labor hours” during Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year. The challenge is meant to address the gaming company’s limited Black Friday hours allotment.
“Hours have always been a sensitive subject for the managers. They’re typically running their stores off strict hour allotments which causes the managers to overwork themselves or run their stores with limited help,” a former GameStop employee told Kotaku.
GameStop has experienced extensive financial hardship like most retail companies during the COVID-19 outbreak. As a result, they have been forced to close over 400 stores this year with more closures expected next year. They faced intense scrutiny for declaring themselves as “essential” during the shutdowns in March. The company instructed its employees to cover their arms and legs with plastic bags when they lacked proper safety equipment during the early days of the pandemic. Once again, the company is facing backlash for making its staff compete for extra hours.
GameStop has not publicly commented on the challenge.
