In fact, according to Statistic Brain, 23% of Black Friday retail shoppers will camp out at a store, arriving at midnight or before.
If you plan to partake in this festival of consumerism, here are some interesting trivia facts surrounding Black Friday for you to ponder and talk about with the other people next to you in line. Or if you don’t plan to go out, maybe you can impress your family members with this random knowledge to help pass the phases of awkward silence.
Either way, enjoy!
The History of Black Friday
Does An Earlier Thanksgiving = More Spending?
In the 1930’s, the day following Thanksgiving had become the day that signified the official start of the holiday shopping season for most retailers.
However, retailers became dissatisfied with the length of the shopping season. At the time, Thanksgiving was held on the last Thursday of November. Strong encouragement from lobbyists prompted President Theodore Roosevelt to change Thanksgiving to the second-to-last Thursday of the month. This change caused a substantial amount of controversy, forcing Congress to step in and negotiate between the two camps. The compromise brought about Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday in November.
Thus, this gave retailers another full week of holiday shopping to cash in on!
Source: Wanderful.com
Where Did the Name Black Friday Really Come From?
Along with the cheese-steak and the hoagie, the term Black Friday is rooted in Philadelphia.
In the 1950’s, police in The City of Brotherly Love used the term to describe the horde of shoppers from the suburbs that descended into the city for the days after Thanksgiving, according to Bonnie Taylor-Blake, a neuroscience researcher at the University of North Carolina. The city promoted big sales and decorations, ahead of the Army/Navy football game on Saturday.
“It was a double whammy. Traffic cops were required to work 12-hour shifts, no one could take off and people would flood the sidewalks, parking lots and streets. The cops had to deal with it all and coined the term.”
City merchants also started to use the term to describe the long lines and shopping mayhem at their stores. “It became this comical reference to downtown Philadelphia following Thanksgiving.”
In 1961, there was a push to re-brand the day as “Big Friday.”
“They were worried the negative connotation would keep people from coming to the city,” said Taylor-Blake, who is also a member American Dialect Society.
Clearly, the effort didn’t catch on. So now, the retailers have learned to embrace the name, and have even expanded the one-day shopping event into a four-day marathon.
Source: CNN Money
Starting Black Friday Earlier and Earlier …
Prior to 1960, there was an unspoken rule that retailers would not begin their major holiday advertising campaigns until after the Thanksgiving Parades were complete. These parades took place the day after Thanksgiving. Well-known retailers like Macy’s sponsored these parades, using them to advertise. This advertising encouraged people to begin shopping and many did.
Source: Wanderful.com
In the late 2000’s many retailers had crept to starting at 5:00 AM or even 4:00 AM.
This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers (including Target, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, and Bealls) opened at midnight for the first time.
In 2012, Walmart and several other retailers announced that they would open most of their stores at 8:00 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day (except in states where opening on Thanksgiving is prohibited due to blue laws, such as Massachusetts where they still opened around midnight), prompting calls for a walkout among some workers.
In 2014 stores such as JCPenney, Best Buy, and Radio Shack opened at 5 PM on Thanksgiving Day while stores such as Target, Walmart, Belk, and Sears opened at 6 PM on Thanksgiving Day.
Source: Wikipedia.com
Recent Black Friday Stats
Just how much do American’s shop on Black Friday?
In 2014:
- Black Friday Consumer Spending:
- In-Store Spending = $50,900,000,000
- Online Spending = $1,505,000,000
- Average Spent / Person = $380.95
- Annual number of consumers that shop in stores or online on Black Friday = 133,700,000
- Average consumer internet spending on Black Friday = $159.55
- Percent of Black Friday retail shoppers who camped out at a store (arriving at midnight or before) = 23 %
- Total Cyber Monday spending = $2,038,000,000
- Total retail spending in November and December (excluding autos, gas, restaurants) = $616,900,000,000
Source: Statisticbrain.com
More interesting facts:
- 70% = Percentage of consumers who say that stores should be closed on Thanksgiving this year, up from 60% in 2012.
- Respectively, the percentages of shoppers ages 55+ and 18 to 24 and who think it’s “a great idea” for stores to be open on Thanksgiving = 16% vs. 50%.
- Number of days before Black Friday that two women in California began camping out at a Best Buy in order to be first in line for deals = 22. They hope to buy a cheap TV.
- Proportion of Thanksgiving Day shoppers who admit to hitting the stores on the holiday while under the influence of alcohol = 12% (according to a survey conducted on the behalf of the coupon site RetailMeNot).
- Percentage of consumers who say that Black Friday is meaningless because “there will be more sales throughout the holidays.” = 70%.
- The average discount on Black Friday for 6,000 items tracked last year by the deal-hunting site ShopAdvisor = Less Than 5%. Researchers found that the average discount during the holiday period was highest on December 18 = 17.5%.
- Proportion of Americans who feel pressured to spend more than they can afford during the holiday season = 39%.
Source: Time Money
Readers: How many of you will go out shopping on Black Friday? Any good horror stories to share?
Featured image courtesy of David Haines | Flickr
Nice MMD. I enjoyed reading the history of Black Friday and some facts especially about those hitting the stores on the holiday while under the influence of alcohol. This one is really weird and new.
I would not have guessed that, but it does make sense. Think of how many people drink on Thanksgiving, and so if they go out shopping on Thanksgiving day, then it counts!
We sit Black Friday out, and just sit back and watch the carnage. 🙂
Ha! There’s been a few times on Black Friday that I’ve driven past Walmart and Target and half expecting to see at that very moment the building walls fall backwards / implode on itself. Not that I want to see anyone get hurt or anything, just in the classic cartoon sense that the anger and frustration somehow led to a whole building falling down.
When I was younger I’d go with my Mom shopping on Black Friday. We’d have a little bonding time while we shopped for my sister and Dad. I haven’t been shopping on Black Friday in YEARS. I’m not the type to buy things just because they’re on sale. If I know I want to get something for a loved one as a gift, I’ll go online and see what deals I can find if any, but that’s about it.
I get that. When my daughter was younger, her and I would go out on Black Friday to buy things for my wife and her brother. But rather than seeing it as kind of a funny joke (from how crazy people were acting), I think it actually confused her. Now we just order stuff online or buy presents way in advance.
Ah, Black Friday. That time of the year where our vision goes red and we resort to horrors spoken of only on the most illicit Dark Web sites in order to get a few bucks off on a tablet for someone else’s kids. It’s where we display our animalistic nature for all the world to see, unable to act in a manner suitable for civilized humans or sentient life forms.
I hate Black Friday. Any shopper that is at the mall that say–or on Thanksgiving even moreso–deserves to have a miserable shopping experience involving declined credit cards, large angry soccer moms fighting for the toy in your hand, and trained attack lions programmed to wipeout mindless consumerism.
I despise the idea of stores that open on Thanksgiving, and for the people that think it’s a great idea to open, may you live a life full of missing out on great meals in favor of bland frozen imitations. I would actually hug anybody that went to serve Thanksgiving dinner to shoppers waiting on line on Thursday, only to reveal that the food actually went to the retail workers and if the customers wanted to eat, they would have to go home and spend time with their families instead. Thanksgiving is one of the only holidays in this country that actually means anything, so let’s not push it out of the way in favor of Christmas, whose only meaning is “Buy stuff” and whose only function is another Stay Home From Work Day.
Where’s that War On Christmas Fox keeps crying about? Sounds like a great idea!
MMD, you forgot a couple other interesting Black Friday statistics:
–Percentage of Thanksgiving shoppers who should be buried under eight feet of snow while waiting to get in line at a mall that the security staff decided to open after marathoning The Lord Of The Rings trilogy–100%
–Percentage of shoppers that should be trampled by wildebeests let lose in the jewelry section of Macy’s–100%
–Percentage of shoppers that need to desperately use the bathroom while standing on line at Sears–100%
–Percentage of lines open and moving quickly so that these shoppers can quickly be rung up and can get to the bathroom already–25%, available only to those who survive a Hunger Games battle royale.
–Percentage of bathrooms that need to be made available to these customers–0%
–Percentage of customers that, if they can’t afford to buy Christmas gifts without trampling each other on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, maybe shouldn’t be buy gifts for everyone they know if at all–100%
–Percentage of retail employees that would sooner see you cut down by a hacksaw-wielding madman in a Winnie the Pooh costume than ring up your newphew’s new cheap plastic toy–100%
–Percentage of Angry Retail Bankers that will be avoiding the malls this Black Friday–100%
And to everyone who is angry that Christmas is being taken away from them and that businesses are trading away the colors and fun of years past for the political correctness that infests our culture today….…
………HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!
Sincerely,
ARB–Angry Retail Banker
Wow, it looks like I missed a few good stats! 🙂 Thanks for adding all of those ARB.
Happy Thanksgiving MMD! I agree on the pressure that I have to spend more on products or gifts during Black Friday, probably because I have to take the opportunity and deals available while it’s there.
You are definitely not alone. I think its all too easy to get caught up in the idea that you are missing out on a deal if you don’t buy right now. TV’s for $100. Tablets for $50. Etc. Yet, most people never stop and ask: Do I really need that TV or tablet? Am I just buying because its cheap and on sale right now?
During the Black Friday, I just wish I had prepared a list of things I needed to buy because I wasn’t able to get all I needed, MMD. Next time, I’d surely get it ready.
A list always help. It’s all too easy to impulse buy once you’re out there in the battlefield!