The term 'Black Friday' originally referred to an 1869 US gold market crash.

A website called Black Friday Death Count or “BFDC” scrapes news headlines for Black Friday-related deaths and injuries reported around the world. It includes the overall count of Black-Friday related deaths, as well as the context for each of them.

Black Friday anecdotes abound. Once, a mall dropped 500 gift certificates from the ceiling into a crowd of 2,000 Black Friday shoppers, who injured each other fighting for them. Another time, publishers of the game Cards Against Humanity convinced 11,000 shoppers to pay $5 for nothing.

Some investors and analysts look at Black Friday’s sales numbers as a way to gauge the overall health of the retail industry—and consumer confidence at large. However, others don’t believe Black Friday results have a particularly significant impact on markets, arguing that the figures only cause short-term gains or losses.

Some argue Black Friday has gone from one day of the year, to two days of the year, including Cyber Monday sales, to, more recently, an entire week. In recent years, companies have offered steep discounts for a week at a time rather than just one or two days.

Brazilians adopted Black Friday in 2010. Today, 60% of Brazilians participate in the shopping event. Large corporations offering Black Friday sales in the US (like Amazon, for instance) began offering similar deals in places like the UK, spreading the holiday internationally.

As online-only retailers like Amazon expanded in the early 2000s, they sought ways to capitalize on Black Friday’s uptick in sales—but they didn’t actually have physical retail stores. Enter: Cyber Monday, a day that now competes with Black Friday for the highest e-commerce sales day of the year.

The archive features advertisements from notable retailers such as Bath & Body Works, Gap, and The Home Depot, among others. These ads span from the years 2000 to 2024, in addition to some from early holiday sales at Macy’s in 1963.

Some posit that this is because tensions tend to run high there as customers fight over a limited physical supply of discounted goods. Another 20% of incidents take place at store entrances, where long lines often form well before the retailer opens its doors.

Specifically, the Retail Dry Goods Association warned Franklin Roosevelt that if the holiday season didn’t begin until after Americans celebrated Thanksgiving on the traditional final Thursday in November, retail sales would tank. In 1941 Congress passed a law that made Thanksgiving the fourth rather than the last Thursday in November.

While the details are not fully agreed upon, many economists point to the Federal Reserve's tightening of the money supply as a prime culprit, leading to a significant deflationary spiral.

This comprehensive podcast video episode from NYU Professor Scott Galloway offers a deep dive into the economics of Black Friday, Galloway believes Black Friday allows corporations to exploit the worst parts of Americans’ consumerist impulses, and warns Americans should not believe purchasing things leads to greater happiness.

This Black Friday episode from Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert podcast features stories both from people who have worked behind the register on Black Friday and those who have stood in line at 4 am to score some deals. From police escorting violent shoppers competing over a discounted laptop computer out of the building, to a false-alarm emergency exit from a Dick's Sporting Goods, the episode is both harrowing and hilarious at times.

In the waning years of the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt attempted to move Thanksgiving up by a week, giving merchants a longer holiday shopping season. After pushback from lawmakers, he reversed course in 1941, permanently fixing the date of Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November.

Online shoppers shelled out some $11.3M per minute between 10 am and 2 pm on Black Friday 2024, according to Adobe Analytics data. The $10.8B online shoppers spent on Black Friday 2024 was more than double the amount they spent online in 2017.

It was originally intended to promote Macy’s upcoming holiday sales. Although it took place on Thanksgiving Day, the parade was initially called the Macy’s Christmas Parade—the name didn’t change until 1927.

Lizabeth Cohen, a history professor at Harvard and author of the book “A Consumer's Republic: The Politics Of Mass Consumption In Postwar America,” has argued that the US government has presented consumerism as a way out of economic crisis or decline since around World War II.

Good Friday commemorates the crucifixion of Jesus, the darkest moment in the Christian story (which makes the name a genuine puzzle). Typical explanations say "good" once meant "holy" or "sacred," while other traditions dub it "sorrowful Friday." Christians observe rather than celebrate the day, with services, fasting, and quiet. It's always two days before Easter, sitting between Maundy (or Holy) Thursday and Easter.

As small businesses across the US were still reeling from the Great Recession, American Express came up with the idea of "Small Business Saturday" to help drive consumer spending to small businesses. Small Business Saturday is the day after Black Friday. In 2011, the Senate passed a resolution supporting Small Business Saturday, and, since then, it's become nationally recognized.

It all started with a match between Princeton and Yale in 1876, attended by fewer than 1,000 fans. That competition spawned an annual tradition attracting millions of viewers across college and professional teams.

Only two years after that stock exchange in Philadelphia started, the largest stock exchange in the US to date was created: the New York Stock Exchange.

A rushed, hectic construction process left the park was in bad shape for its opening, leading to a disastrous first day at the park, which employees came to call “Black Sunday.”

Fueled by margin speculation and intense optimism, stock prices soared to unsustainable levels before collapsing in late October—erasing billions in market value within days.

This data visualization ranks retailers like Target, Walmart, Macy’s, and more by who has the best Black Friday deals on average. Specifically, the visualization uses data from 13 major US retailers in 2023.

The brand soon grew into a cultural icon, hosting the first in-store Santa in 1862, and launching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1924, now a holiday staple. Its flagship Herald Square store became the world’s largest, and its festive window displays set a new standard for holiday celebrations.

Though no statistics support the idea that Friday the 13th is more unlucky than other dates, the myth persists. See a grim collection of unfortunate events that occurred on the date throughout history.

The stock market crash of 1929 helped trigger a period of deflation in the United States by creating a drastic decrease in the total money supply. Because of the United States' central role in the world economy, virtually every single country was impacted by the recession.

The Thanksgiving myth didn’t really start in 1621, argues historian David Silverman in this interview with Smithsonian. Rather, it took hold over 200 years later. During the Civil War, Thanksgiving was declared a national holiday by Abraham Lincoln as a way to promote national unity. The tidy story of friendship between Native Americans and colonists was used to quell racial tensions of the late 19th century.

On a 1958 morning in Fresno, California, about 60,000 people woke up to find a strange rectangular piece of plastic on their doorstep without explanation. Those chosen for the "Fresno Drop" didn't know it yet, but Bank of America was behind the credit card delivery stunt.

In 1787, this founding document gave Congress the right to establish nationwide bankruptcy laws. Legislators took advantage of that power in 1800 when they passed the Bankruptcy Act of 1800, the first comprehensive bankruptcy law at the federal level.

The 1920s in the US "roared" with rapid economic growth after the conclusion of World War I. But in October 1929, the bubbly stock markets crashed dramatically, plunging the nation into the decadelong Great Depression.

From the first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade to opening its flagship store in Herald Square, Macy's has a long and successful history despite its recent financial troubles.

The crash that preceded the Great Depression was the most severe the US has ever experienced. It was 28 times worse than the downturn that followed the Cuban Missile Crisis.