I heard through the grapevine that Pearl Izumi was having a one day "friends and family" sale that started at 9 a.m. yesterday. My friend said he was going to be there at exactly 9 a.m. and he'd see me there.
I got there at 9:05 a.m. and parking was already limited. As I made my way to the entrance I was greeted with a line that stretched four a breast and wrapped around two sides of the Pearl Izumi warehouse. I thought to myself, Peral Izumi sure has a lot of friends and family. I suppose when you make high end athletic clothing near Boulder, CO you are bound to make a lot of friends.
While I walked with the line towards the entrance I tried to think of things I would need. I already have a couple racing kits, which work well for my training. With an empty mind I rounded the corner and walked through the door where I was greeted by a beehive of activity as people picked, prodded, and hustled trying to find the best of the deals. As I looked among the hundreds of people already in the warehouse I knew it wasn't going to be easy to find my friend.
As I looked around there was certainly deals to be had. Most of the items were extras, production mistakes, samples, stuff like that, which is why they were selling them so cheap. For instance, bib shorts were selling for $20. Any bib short in the bike shop with Pearl Izumi on the tag would be over $100. I had to buy a pair of those. Next I went to the accessory area where I was able to find gloves, arm warmers, and socks. Honestly, I think a cyclist can never have enough gloves or socks and the deals were smoking so I bought a bunch of each.
After about an hour of looking I was satisfied with what I had and tried to pay. I wish I had a picture of the line. The check out line snaked through the warehouse for a good quarter mile. As I got in line I noticed that the friend I was suppose to meet was next in line. We chatted for a bit, but we couldn't help but notice that for the full half hour we had been in line we hadn't moved. At this rate it looked like it might be a couple hours before checkout.
Luckily for my friend his brother was there. He gave his brother his stuff to pay so he could leave and get some other stuff done. I too had a lot of stuff to do and I couldn't stand in line for hours to check out. My solution was pretty simple. I got out of line, squirreled my bag in a corner of the warehouse, then left. The sale was from 9 a.m to 2 p.m. so I figured I'd come back when the line had worked itself down. It would be great if the bag was still there when I returned. If not, no big deal. I returned to the warehouse around 1:30 p.m. and without a problem I was able to grab my bag and walk right up to the checkout.
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