A Versace sample sale was temporarily shut down in New York City after more than 1,000 shoppers rushed the designer store for discounts, forcing the NYPD to intervene.
Shoppers wrapped around a block in Chelsea Wednesday morning to cash in on designer goods at massive markdowns. Advertisers for the event promised up to 80 percent off for the famed fashion house’s goods, according to social media and Eventbrite posts. Some people camped out for hours before the sale was set to open, multiple media outlets reported.
But deal-hungry shoppers found themselves faced with intense crowds that packed the block and eventually swarmed the glass doors of the building, prompting the NYPD to get involved. One video from the scene posted to TikTok shows shoppers shoving each other to get a foot through the door.
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“People ran to the front and then they stayed at the front, and then the people in the second batch argued about it and then total chaos ensued,” one man who waited for the sale said in a video. “So now there’s a whole gabble in the front, people are not moving their cars, people are fighting the staff, people are fighting each other.”
Those who made it inside didn’t fare much better. One woman among the lucky few to be admitted said people were “ready to tussle” over the merchandise as they paced around the store in the caption of a video posted from inside.
The fighting was so intense that the NYPD eventually had to clear the entire block of shoppers, temporarily closing the sale.
“I can’t believe it. I came all the way to New York for the Versace sample sale and left with nothing. Because of fighting and stealing they shut the whole thing down,” one woman said on TikTok on Wednesday.
“We’re not even sure if they’re going to open it up tomorrow,” she added, noting that the sale was supposed to run from Wednesday to Saturday.
The NYPD told multiple media outlets that the sale reopened Wednesday afternoon and that no arrests were made there. But to shoppers’ disappointment, it didn’t reopen on Thursday morning.
In an Instagram Story post, event organizer The Sample Sale Guys announced it would be closed on March 28 and would “no longer be open to the public.”
“Please do not come to the venue and line up tomorrow or overnight,” the organizer wrote Wednesday night. “We do not want you to waste your time.”
It was unclear whether the event would reopen as scheduled for shoppers on Friday or Saturday.
