How To Shop Black Friday & What Is It?

What Is Black Friday? My Favourite Time Of The Year!

It’s Black Friday in one week, and it’s the time of the year that I get super excited for! I tend to save up a lot of my money throughout the year and I wait for the amazing deals that come out around this time of the month! Some brands often have their Black Friday deals early, up to one or two weeks before the actual day, as they like to take advantage of people’s money ahead of the rush, so pretty much every day in November, I’m refreshing my favourite websites and hoping there’s some amazing discounts! Abercrombie & Fitch and Hollister have just run some promotions, to get us in the mood, as an extra pre-Black Friday event – it’s literally the best time of the year for shopping!

So, what is Black Friday? I thought I’d give you a little history on it as I actually didn’t know how the day originated. I only knew that it was always the Friday after Thanksgiving, but I never knew what it celebrated. There have been a few uses of the name throughout the decades, some including the heaviest traffic days after Thanksgiving, or people calling in sick so they could have a four day weekend, but it got given the name Black Friday in reference to shopping in the 1970’s as it was the busiest day of the year for people shopping and traffic on the roads. Then in the 1980’s, the term Black Friday also got coined for shopping because retailers generally operated at a loss for most of the year, with their sales figures written in red, and then November – January were the months that they made the most sales throughout the holiday period, with their figures reported in black.

I wondered what makes this day the busiest of the year though and why everyone decided to do their shopping straight after Thanksgiving, so I did a little more research. The day after Thanksgiving has been recorded as the start of the Christmas shopping season since 1952! There’s usually a Santa at the end of the Thanksgiving parades (often sponsored by department stores like Macy’s), indicating that Christmas is just around the corner, and Black Friday marks the very first day to start shopping for the holiday! Over the decades, more and more stores decided to have discounts and sales to encourage purchases and compete against each other, and it’s kind of stuck. Black Friday is now known around the world and we even have discounts in the UK – it’s no longer just the United States and Canada!

So now that we have all the details on how it originated and why it’s called Black Friday, I for one am super excited about this year’s as I’ve been saving up so much money for specific items I want! There’s some coats and leather jackets that I’ve had my eye on for a while and I thought I would share a few tips on how I manage to take advantage of the sales and make the most of it!

How To Shop Black Friday Efficiently

There’s so many amazing things coming our way next week, but two of the biggest discounts that I have paid attention to and noticed over the years are fragrance Black Friday deals, as these are heavily marked down, making them the perfect gifts for Christmas, and discounted electronic items like iPads, Kindles and more on Amazon. Again, making great gifts. Check out my tips below on how to make sure you don’t miss out on the amazing discounts!

• Make a list of the things you want to purchase in order of importance, so you know where to shop first and last. Do this ahead of time. I usually start a month before.

• Keep the tabs open on your browser for specific items you wish to purchase, and then refresh them multiple times a day, through November, looking for early deals.

• Add the items to your shopping basket ahead of time and make sure your cards are stored within your account to make the checkout process super quick and efficient once the discount hits.

• Keep in touch with friends during the sales as often companies will have a minimum spend discount, like 20% off of $500 or 30% off of $800 etc., and combining your items with friends can mean you take advantage of the maximum discounts!

• Check websites like mine for information on the best discounts and deals around! I do an annual Black Friday post and I list all of the discounts happening across all of our favourite fashion/beauty retailers. I list the codes and information about them, all in one big post. You can see a previous example here! I do all the hard work for you!

The best thing is for you to be patient, alert, and quick! Everyone goes crazy with their shopping at this time of the year, websites can crash, stock sells out fast, and you can miss out in the click of a finger. Taking note of these tips I just gave you will really help you grab your must have pieces! It’s literally the best time of the year to start doing your Christmas gift buying online, as well as furnishing your house with electronic discounts etc. I cannot wait to share my items that I plan to purchase, but stay tuned for my Black Friday deals roundup post on the 26th November! I’ve got your back! Lorna.