Costco, Nordstrom Rack websites crash as furious customers try to shop Black Friday sales
- Black Friday hasn't technically started yet but the sales are in full swing, and retailers are already being impacted by website outages.
- Both Nordstrom Rack and Costco have experienced issues. Customers have taken to social media to complain about being unable to complete orders on their sites.
- Facebook and Instagram have also been impacted by outages. According to web optimization company Yottaa, these crashes may have been caused by increased traffic from shoppers using the apps.
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Black Friday is in full swing and the shopping frenzy that comes with it is already taking its toll on certain retailers.
Late Wednesday night/early Thursday morning, both Nordstrom Rack and Costco were experiencing issues with their sites as shoppers frantically shopped the Black Friday deals in advance. Business Insider was first alerted to these site crashes by web optimization company Yottaa.
Because of this, customers have taken to social media to complain that they were unable to complete orders online.
As of 12 p.m. ET, Costco had a banner on its site informing customers that its website is "experiencing slow response times."
Meanwhile, Nordstrom Rack's site appears to be up and running again. The retailer previously responded to shoppers on Twitter, saying that it was "working hard" to resolve the issue.
Neither Nordstrom Rack or Costco was immediately available to comment when contacted by Business Insider.
Facebook and Instagram have also been impacted by fairly widespread outages on Thanksgiving day. Business Insider's Sinéad Baker found that nearly 4,000 users had reported issues with Instagram as of Thursday morning, citing data from outage-tracking website Down Detector.
According to Yottaa's chief technology officer, Bob Buffone, these social media outages may have been caused by increased traffic from shoppers using these apps as retailers are heavily pushing promotions on these platforms over the holiday season.
More on Black Friday 2019:
- Customers are slamming Macy's, Best Buy, and Target for opening stores on Thanksgiving
- Walmart shoppers are threatening to boycott the store after discovering that employees aren't paid extra to work on Thanksgiving
- Charts reveal how the internet has changed Black Friday forever
- Here's when stores will open their doors for Black Friday sales
- Most Americans want stores to stay closed on Thanksgiving, except for Gen Z
- Americans are more likely to spend less than more this holiday season, according to our survey