Black Friday, Zombie Holiday

If shopping is a sport, then Black Friday is the Super Bowl. Mike Albo argues that the yearly hysteria over Bionicles and Barbies reflects a dark vision of how we buy.

The glowing Rudolphs and inflatable menorahs have been foisted up over neighborhood supermarkets and gas stations; the jingly seasonal soundtracks are dribbling out of hidden speakers in shopping centers; and for sure you’ve seen that way-too-energetic Gap ad: “Go Christmas! Go Hanukah! Go Kwanzaa! Go Solstice!”

Ugh, go away. But no, here it comes. Black Friday: bigger, weirder, and seemingly more vital to our economy than ever before.

After Thursday’s gorgefest, Black Friday goes off like a starting gun and we rush around buying candles, Kindles, Bionicles and Barbie Twilight dolls. Inevitably, someone gets hurt. Or worse. Last year, Jdimytai Damour, a temporary worker at a Wal-Mart in Valley Stream, New York, was trampled to death by shoppers who burst through the doors before the store's 5 a.m. opening. He was 6’4” and had been at the job about a week.

“It is impossible to keep things on the shelf,” says one apparel employee. “I was constantly just pulling stuff out of drawers and before it goes on shelf, people would pull it out of my hand.”

Still, stores are amping up. Tanger Outlet Centers are arranging a Midnight Madness Sale starting at 12 a.m., Old Navy plans to open its doors at 3 a.m., and J.C. Penney Co. is offering free wakeup calls for shoppers, as well as a hundred sale items, including 50-60 percent off women’s “cold weather wraps and accessories” and 50 percent off Remington razors. Shaving accessories: The gift that keeps on giving.

“I’m up when the doors open, just to people watch,” says a commenter on the Tennesean.com. “It’s just the fun of watching everybody fight over the item they only have five of. It’s usually a family affair—last year we were at Opry Mills in our pajamas.”

“It’s a fun day to spend with my family. A tradition that we have been doing for years and years now,” says a commenter on the “I Love Black Friday!!!” forum. “I can’t imagine really kick-starting the holiday season without it!! Does anyone else agree with me??”

Apparently yes. According to a survey conducted for the National Retail Federation, 134 million people are eager to get their hands on sale items this year, and 10.3 percent of shoppers plan on getting to stores between midnight and 3 a.m. for the best deals.

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• Lee Eisenberg: 7 Signs You’re a ShopaholicThe phrase “Black Friday” has complicated origins. Coined to describe the Fisk/Gould scandal and financial panic of 1869, its modern meaning wasn’t used until the mid-1960s. Last year, Bonnie Taylor-Blake, a neuroscience researcher at the University of North Carolina with an interest in linguistics and folklore, found the earliest usage of Black Friday (as we know it) in an advertisement placed in the January 1966 edition of the American Philatelist.

The ad is an optimistic letter to readers from Martin Apfelbaum, the executive VP of a stamp collecting shop on Walnut Street in Philadelphia. Apfelbaum gleefully lists the number of sales his store enjoyed the day after Thanksgiving (100 bid sheets in the mail, 15 collections coming to appraisal, over 100 customers). In an era before suburbs with their shopping centers, when thousands of Don and Betty Drapers flocked into Philly on the Friday after Thanksgiving to shop, Apfelbaum mentions that the police refer to the day as “Black Friday.”

“It is not a term of endearment to them,” says Apfelbaum in his letter. “‘Black Friday’ officially opens the Christmas shopping season in Center City, and it usually brings massive traffic jams and overcrowded sidewalks as the downtown stores are mobbed from opening to closing. All in all, ‘Black Friday’ certainly lived up to its reputation.”

But like any good businessman, Apfelbaum knew how give Black Friday a positive spin: “Is this activity unusual? A little. But just stop in on any day of the week and you will see more action at Apfelbaum's than at any stamp shop in the world.”