On Friday 24 September 1869, a disastrous slump on the US stock exchange led to the introduction of a term that is now understood as the opposite of its original meaning. While it then had negative connotations, Black Friday today refers to a weekend of bargain shopping in late November. The name refers to retailers being ‘in the black’, that is, in credit rather than in debt.
History of Black Friday
The Lucky Few
First introduced in the 1980s, Black Friday was soon extended over the weekend, as it turned out to be the most profitable day in the retail industry. Shoppers were encouraged to take advantage of major discounts only available during the event. Retail and consumer spending drive up to 70 per cent of US gross domestic product (GDP), which remains, controversially, the indicator of the wealth of an entire nation. The success of Black Friday, which was even declared a public holiday in some states, led to this event going global.
Queues and Crowds
As Black Friday was aggressively marketed and grew in popularity in the 1990s, stores began opening their doors at midnight or very early on Friday morning. Bargain hunters queued or even camped outside in the cold. When the doors were finally opened, a stampede often occurred.
Death at the Mall
As a consequence, Black Friday-related incidents in America have left dozens injured, some fatally. In 2008, an employee at the Walmart store on Long Island, New York was trampled to death when more than two thousand shoppers broke through the shop’s front door. Between 2012 and 2016, eighteen shootings were reported: in Tallahassee, Florida, two men were shot over a parking spot. In 2020, two teenagers were stabbed at a California mall.
Cyber Sales
Nevertheless, it is not the savagely competitive spirit promoted by marketing tactics that appears to concern governments, but the physical gathering of people. That is why, in the early 2000s, retailers responded to the trend of shoppers going online the Monday after Thanksgiving weekend by introducing Cyber Monday. By 2017, Americans were spending $6.6 billion online during Cyber Monday sales events, just short of the $7.9 billion spent on Black Friday itself.
Shopping madness
For some people, it’s shopping heaven. For others, it’s shopping hell. Black Friday is the busiest – and craziest - shopping day of the year in the US.
Philadelphia story
The name Black Friday originated in Philadelphia in the 1950s. It referred to the state’s busy streets,
and not its busy shops. Many people travel on the day after Thanksgiving Day, resulting in traffic
congestion. Later, other states adopted the name but changed its meaning. “In the red” is a term for
“operating at a loss” and “in the black” is a term for “operating at a profit”. The idea was that shops
traditionally operated at a loss between January and November, but they started to make a profit on
Black Friday, which is the start of the Christmas shopping season.
International
Black Friday is not an official holiday, but many people don’t work on that day – so they can go shopping instead! When Black Friday first became popular, people from Canada travelled to
the US to go shopping. However, in the late 2000s, Canada started its own Black Friday. Now many other countries, including the UK and Australia, have their own Black Friday, too.
Sleeping out
In the US, most shops open very early on Black Friday, or even late on Thanksgiving Day. Most of them have major sales, and some of them also offer special prices for a limited time, or a limited quantity of free things. For this reason, millions of Americans sleep outside shops on Thanksgiving night – so they can be the first people into the shops when they open, and buy the best and cheapest things.
Chaos
Every year, there are reports of violence between shoppers on Black Friday. When the shops open, people often trample each other while rushing inside, and then fight over things that they want to buy. Many people think that Black Friday is dangerous and stupid. Others think it’s unfair because
the shops’ employees have to work long hours. And some accuse the shops of selling only low-quality products.
The good news is that you can avoid the chaos of Black Friday but still benefit from the great sales – by shopping online on the Monday after Black Friday, which is called “Cyber Monday”. Happy (and safe) shopping!