The term ‘Black Friday’ was first used to refer to the day after Thanksgiving Thursday, where factory workers would call in sick so they could enjoy a 4 day weekend with family.
The retail version began in Philadelphia in 1960s, police used the term Black Friday to describe the chaos caused by large numbers of suburban tourists coming into the city to begin their holiday shopping, the day after Thanksgiving. Retailers originally referred to the day as Big Friday on accountof the huge sales.
By the1980s, retailers began to shift the narrative to profit because it was one of the big annual days when sales could shift their business from being 'in the red' to being 'in the black'. Thus began the loss-to-profit profit narrative: red-to-black, and the Black Friday concept spread across the USA and around the world, morphing into the purpose built consumption vechile it is today.
The USA, Germany and Brazil accounted for 45% of global Black Friday searches in 2021. According to Adobe via CNBC, in 2020, ecommerce sales during November including Cyber Monday reached $100 billion.
Black Friday promotes mass consumerism and encourages people to buy products purely because they’re on sale with little regard for how often they will be used. Somewhere between 50 and 80% of products sold on Black Friday end up in landfill or in the recycle system, with most products will be used a handful of times before being discarded. Millions of tons of resources are required to manufacture and ship Black Friday products - to stores, consumers, returns and landfill.
Simply don't buy anything you don't need. If you are easily sucked in by perceived sales, stay away from electronic devices and shops that lure you into with click bait!
Oil Production infographic: Visual Capitalist
Thank you Statista for the graph - it should have been attributed. Tuesday, 22 November 2022