Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving and is the beginning of the traditional Christmas shopping season in the United States. Since Thanksgiving falls on the fourth Thursday in November in the United States, Black Friday may be as early as the 23rd and as late as the 29th day of November. Retailers often decorate for the Christmas season weeks beforehand. Many retailers open very early (typically 5 A.M.) and offer doorbuster deals and loss leaders to draw people to their stores. Although Black Friday, as the first shopping day after Thanksgiving, has served as the unofficial beginning of the Christmas season at least since the start of the modern Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1924, the term "Black Friday" has been traced back only to the 1970s. "Black Friday" was originally so named because of the heavy traffic on that day, although most contemporary uses of the term refer instead to it as the beginning of the period in which retailers are in the black (i.e., turning a profit). For the Canadian holiday, see Thanksgiving (Canada). ... For other uses, see Christmas (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see November (disambiguation). ... This article is being considered for deletion in accordance with Wikipedias deletion policy. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... In marketing, a loss leader is an item that is sold below cost in an effort to stimulate other profitable sales. ... “Macys Day Parade” redirects here. ... The 1970s decade refers to the years from 1970 to 1979, also called The Seventies. ...

The news media frequently refer to Black Friday as the busiest retail shopping day of the year, but this is not always accurate. While it has been one of the busiest days in terms of customer traffic,^[1][2] in terms of actual sales volume, from 1993 through 2001 Black Friday was usually the fifth to tenth busiest day.^[3] In 2002 and 2004, however, Black Friday ranked second place.^[4] The busiest retail shopping day of the year in the United States (in terms of both sales and customer traffic) usually has been the Saturday before Christmas.^[5] In 2003 and 2005, however, Black Friday actually did reach first place.^[6]

In some cities it's not uncommon to see shoppers lined up hours before stores with big sales open. Once inside the stores shoppers often rush and grab, as many stores have only a few of the big draw items. Electronics and popular toys are often the most sought after items and may be sharply discounted. Because of the shoulder-to-shoulder crowds, many choose to stay home and avoid the hectic shopping experience. The local media often will cover the event, mentioning how early the shoppers began lining up at various stores and providing video of the shoppers standing in line and later leaving with their purchased items. Traditionally Black Friday sales were intended for those shopping for Christmas gifts. For some particularly popular items, some shop these sales in order to get deep discounts on items they can then resell, typically online.

Origin of the name "Black Friday"

Stress from large crowds

The earliest uses of "Black Friday" refer to the heavy traffic on that day, an implicit comparison to the extremely stressful and chaotic experience of Black Tuesday (the 1929 stock-market crash) or other black days. The earliest known references to "Black Friday" (in this sense) are from two newspaper articles from November 29, 1975, that explicitly refer to the day's hectic nature and heavy traffic. The first reference is in an article entitled "Army vs. Navy: A Dimming Splendor," in The New York Times: Crowd gathering on Wall Street. ... is the 333rd day of the year (334th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1975 (MCMLXXV) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... The New York Times is a daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed internationally. ...

Philadelphia police and bus drivers call it "Black Friday" - that day each year between Thanksgiving Day and the Army-Navy game. It is the busiest shopping and traffic day of the year in the Bicentennial City as the Christmas list is checked off and the Eastern college football season nears conclusion.

The derivation is made even more explicit in an Associated Press article entitled "Folks on Buying Spree Despite Down Economy," which ran in the Titusville Herald on the same day: The Associated Press, or AP, is an American news agency, the worlds largest such organization. ... Titusville is a city located in Crawford County, Pennsylvania. ...

Store aisles were jammed. Escalators were nonstop people. It was the first day of the Christmas shopping season and despite the economy, folks here went on a buying spree. . . . . "That's why the bus drivers and cab drivers call today 'Black Friday,'" a sales manager at Gimbels said as she watched a traffic cop trying to control a crowd of jaywalkers. "They think in terms of headaches it gives them."

Both articles have a Philadelphia dateline, suggesting the term may have originated in that area. For other uses, see Philadelphia (disambiguation) and Philly. ... A dateline is a short piece of text included in news articles that describes where and when the story was filed, though the date is often omitted. ...

Accounting practice

Look up in the red, in the black in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Most contemporary uses of the term focus instead on the theory that retailers traditionally operated at a financial loss for most of the year (January through November) and made their profit during the holiday season. When this would be recorded in the financial records, once-common accounting practices would use red ink to show negative amounts and black ink to show positive amounts. Black Friday, under this theory, is the beginning of the period where retailers would no longer have losses (the red) and instead take in the year's profits (the black). (Retailers' profitability varies, but some retailers are indeed dependent on the holiday season for their profits.) This sense has been traced back to a November 26, 1982, broadcast of ABC News' World News Tonight, which said: Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Wiktionary (a portmanteau of wiki and dictionary) is a multilingual, Web-based project to create a free content dictionary, available in over 150 languages. ... It has been suggested that Accounting scholarship be merged into this article or section. ... is the 330th day of the year (331st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... ABC News Special Report ident, circa 2006 ABC News is a division of American television and radio network ABC, owned by The Walt Disney Company. ... ABC World News Tonight is the ABC television networks flagship evening news program. ...

Some merchants label the day after Thanksgiving Black Friday because business today can mean the difference between red ink and black on the ledgers. But this year hefty sales are vital not only to the stores but to the entire economy.

Because the heavy traffic etymology is contemporaneous with the earliest known uses of the term, while the black ink theory apparently was not suggested until several years later, the accounting practice origin is unlikely to be correct.

Other names

Many companies have begun referring to this day as "Green Friday" instead of "Black Friday", because of the negative connotation that it may have. (See Black Friday Disambiguation for a list of disasters and scandals with this name.) Some anti-consumerists believe it is nothing more than a marketing ploy to accentuate the sales, while marginalizing the crowds, lines, and franticness of this day. Black Friday may refer to the following historical events: Black Friday (1869), the Fisk-Gould Scandal (24 Sep), a financial crisis in the United States Black Friday (1881), the Eyemouth Disaster (14 Oct), in which 189 Scottish fishermen lost their lives in a European windstorm Black Friday (1887), hanging of...

Although it might not be as widespread, the name "Blitz" or "Blitz Day" has also been used as a name[1].

Black Friday on the Internet

Adscan sites

Certain websites offer information about Black Friday specials up to a month in advance. The text listings of items and prices are usually accompanied by pictures of the actual ad circulars. These are either leaked by insiders or intentionally released by large retailers to give consumers insight and allow them time to plan.

Cyber Monday

Main article: Cyber Monday

The term Cyber Monday, a neologism invented by the National Retail Federation's Shop.org division, refers to the Monday immediately following Black Friday, which unofficially marks the beginning of the Christmas online shopping season. This article does not cite its references or sources. ... A neologism (Greek νεολογισμός [neologismos], from νέος [neos] new + λόγος [logos] word, speech, discourse + suffix -ισμός [-ismos] -ism) is a word, term, or phrase which has been recently created (coined) — often to apply to new concepts, to synthesize pre-existing concepts, or to make older terminology sound more contemporary. ... The National Retail Federation is the worlds largest retail trade association, with membership that comprises all retail formats and channels of distribution including department, specialty, discount, catalog, Internet, independent stores, chain restaurants and grocery stores as well as the industrys key trading partners of retail goods and services. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

In recent years, Cyber Monday has become a busy day for online retailers, with some sites offering low prices and other promotions on that day. Like Black Friday, Cyber Monday is often wrongly said to be the busiest shopping day of the year for online shoppers, although in reality several days later in the holiday shopping season are busier.

Controversy

DMCA

In recent years, some retailers (including Wal-Mart, Target Corporation, Best Buy, and Staples, Inc.) have claimed that the advertisements they send in advance of Black Friday and the prices included in those advertisements are intellectual property and protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. ... This article is about the United States retail company. ... For the defunct chain of catalog showrooms, see Best Products. ... Staples, Inc. ... The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a United States copyright law which implements two 1996 WIPO treaties. ...

Using the take down provision of the DMCA, these retailers have threatened various web sites who post Black Friday prices to the Internet in advance of the intended release date by the retailers. This policy apparently derives from a fear that competitors, in addition to customers, will also have access to this information and use it for competitive advantage. The actual validity of the claim that prices are protected intellectual property is uncertain as the prices themselves (though not the advertisements) might be considered a fact in which case they would not receive the same level of protection as a copyrighted work.

The benefit of threatening Internet sites with a DMCA based lawsuit has proved tenuous at best. While some sites have complied with the requests, others have either ignored the threats or simply continued to post the information under the name of a similar sounding fictional retailer.

References

1. ^ ShopperTrak (October 4, 2006). ShopperTrak Predicts Top 10 Shopping Days of Holiday 2006. Press Release.
2. ^ International Council of Shopping Centers. Top Ten Holiday Shopping Days 2004.
3. ^ Purdue University News Service. "Christmas Shopping Facts and Figures", Press Release, Nov. 22, 2000. 
4. ^ International Council of Shopping Centers. Holiday Watch: Media Guide 2006 Holiday Facts and Figure.
5. ^ Barbara and David P. Mikkelson (Nov. 20, 2006). Black Friday. Urban Legends Reference Pages.
6. ^ International Council of Shopping Centers. Holiday Watch: Media Guide 2006 Holiday Facts and Figure.