Black Friday 

Black Friday refers to the day after the US Thanksgiving holiday, which has also traditionally been a holiday itself for many employees. It is typically a day full of special shopping deals and heavy discounts and is considered the beginning of the holiday shopping season.

In history, Black Friday was a stock market catastrophe that took place on September 24, 1869. On that day, after a period of rampant speculation, the price of gold plummeted, and the markets crashed.

It’s common for retailers to offer special promotions and open their doors during the pre-dawn hours on Black Friday to attract customers. To keep up with the competition, some retailers have gone so far as to keep their operations going on the Thanksgiving holiday, while others begin offering deals earlier during November.

Really avid bargain-hunters have been known to camp out overnight on Thanksgiving to secure a place in line at a favorite store; the most fanatical have been known to skip Thanksgiving dinner altogether and camp out in parking lots for days or even weeks to get great deals. The promotions usually continue through Sunday, and traditional brick-and-mortar stores see a spike in sales.

Retailers may spend an entire year planning their Black Friday sales. They use the day as an opportunity to offer rock-bottom prices on overstock inventory and to offer doorbusters and discounts on seasonal items, such as holiday decorations and typical holiday gifts.

Retailers also offer significant discounts on big-ticket items and top-selling brands of TVs, smart devices, and other electronics, luring customers in the hope that, once inside, they will purchase higher-margin goods. The contents of Black Friday advertisements are often so highly anticipated that retailers go to great lengths to ensure that they don’t leak out publicly beforehand.

Consumers often shop on Black Friday for the hottest trending items, which can lead to stampedes and violence in the absence of adequate security. For example, on Black Friday in 1983, customers engaged in scuffles, fistfights, and stampedes in stores across the U.S. to buy Cabbage Patch Kids dolls, that year’s must-have toy, which was also believed to be in short supply. Appallingly, a worker at a big store was even trampled to death on Black Friday in 2008, as throngs of shoppers pushed their way into the store when the doors opened.

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