How Many Days Until Black Friday?

Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving, traditionally the biggest in-store shopping day of the year. The name originally had nothing to do with retail profits. Philadelphia police coined the term in the 1960s to describe the chaotic crowds and traffic that descended on the city the day after Thankgiving.

🛒 Black Friday History

🛒 When Did Black Friday Sales Start?

Retailers later put a positive spin on the name by claiming it was the day their books went from red ink to black ink (loss to profit), though thats mostly a myth. The tradition of post-Thanksgiving sales existed since the early 1900s, but it became the frenzied doorbuster event we know today in the 1980s and 1990s.

📊 Black Friday by the Numbers

About 130 million Americans shop on Black Friday weekend. Average spending is around $325 per person. Online Black Friday sales have surpassed in-store sales since 2019. The deals are not always as good as they look, consumer studies consistently find that about 40% of Black Friday "deals" are available at the same or lower prices at other times of the year.

🛒 Are Black Friday Deals Actually Good?

Not always. Consumer research consistently finds that about 40% of Black Friday deals are available at the same or lower prices at other times of the year. The best genuine deals tend to be on electronics, particularly TVs and laptops, where manufacturers create specific Black Friday models at lower price points. Clothing deals are usually comparable to end-of-season sales. The worst deals tend to be on luxury goods and jewelry, where the "original price" is often inflated to make the discount look bigger.

⚠️ How Dangerous Is Black Friday Shopping?

Black Friday has a documented history of injuries and even deaths from crowd crushes at store openings. Since 2006, there have been 17 documented deaths and over 125 injuries during Black Friday events in the US. The most notorious incident occurred at a Walmart in Long Island in 2008, when a temporary employee was trampled to death by a crowd of about 2,000 shoppers. These incidents have pushed many retailers to move away from doorbuster-style openings in favor of online and extended-window sales.