The Craziest Best Deals We’ve Seen During the Holidays

Holiday Sale from My Alarm CenterThe holiday season is always a time for great deals: every store and its mother promises screaming Black Friday discounts, and many extend their offerings throughout the entire Thanksgiving-to-Christmas season.

And while every circular and online store yells from the rooftops that their deal is best deal, there’s no doubt that some deals are better than other. Let’s take a stroll down holiday deal lane, with some of our favorite deals from over the years:

Half-priced iPods

Back in 2010, iPods were all the rage – and they had the $299 price tag to prove it. And being Apple products, blazing deals usually meant 10% off, if you were lucky. But that year, Toys R Us offered one of the best Black Friday deals ever, at least where Apple electronics are concerned: Not only did the store drop the price to $199, but they threw a $50 gift card into the mix. All told, you could get your hands on an iPod for $149 – half the retail price. We’re betting this deal thrilled many kids (and their smart-shopping parents) that year.

 2011: Sub-$200 Xbox360 with Kinect

There were a lot of good deals to be had in 2011, but one of our favorites was this gem: Walmart’s $199.96 Xbox360 with Kinect Console. To sweeten the deal, Walmart bundled in a $50 gift card to use on anything in the store. Best Buy offered a similar deal: $200 for a 250GB Xbox360 with Kinect, with Halo:Reach and Fable III included.

2012: $40 Nook e-reader

When we think blazing holiday deals, we usually think of TVs, tablets and laptops – super high-priced electronics. But in 2012, Sears offered a screaming deal on the Nook Simple Touch e-reader. For just $39.99, the department store gave hardcore readers one of the best gifts Black Friday has ever seen.

2013: $30 Smartphone

This year welcomed one of the best smartphone discounts we’ve ever seen: Best Buy’s $29.99 HTC One – 85% off the retail price of $199.99. The company also had on offer the LG G2 for a whopping $24.99, or 87.5% off retail price. Clearly, 2013 was a good year to upgrade your smartphone.

2014: 50-inch, Name-brand Flat-screen for under $200

In 2014, Best Buy slaughtered its TV-selling competition with a $199 deal for a 50″ Panasonic 1080p LED LCD HDTV as their headlining doorbuster. The unbelievable price more than outshone all others, although Target did its best with a $119 40″ 1080p LED flat-screen from Element.

2015: Half-price Home Security

If you’ll permit us to toot our own horn, My Alarm Center is proud to offer one of the year’s best deals: 50% off our cellular monitoring (deal ends 12/31/2015). And just like the TV, this is the gift that keeps on giving – you’ll appreciate it all year round, knowing that your family is safe and protected. And at half the price, to boot!

What great deals have you scored in the past? And what was your best buy of 2015?