Black Friday, Eh?

Black Friday, Eh?

Black Friday is the name given to the day following the American Thanksgiving. Traditionally it’s the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. On this day, most major retailers open extremely early and offer promotional sales to kick off the holiday shopping season, similar to the post Christmas Boxing Day sales here in Canada. It has routinely been the busiest shopping day of the year.

The day’s name originated in Philadelphia by the Police Department, because the heavy and disruptive pedestrian and vehicle traffic which would occur on the day after Thanksgiving. The term has been in use prior to 1961 and began to see broader use outside of the Philadelphia area around 1975. As time went on, the term received an alternative explanation. Black Friday began to indicate a point at which retailers begin to turn a profit, or as bookkeepers call it, be “in the black”.

As Canadians in a border city, this explanation should help make our decision easier to keep our money in this city. Knowing now what the term “Black Friday” means, which merchants would you like to see “in the black”, the ones across the border or the ones in your own hometown?

Let’s make our own Black Friday a success.
Happy shopping Canada, eh!

Labels

Black Friday, Shopping, Annual Event