What do you think of when you hear the term, “black friday”? Maybe you think of shopping, waiting in lines till dawn, or discounts on normally high priced albums that results in fights. While this is what black friday has come to represent, it did not start this way.

It all started in Philadelphia; the day after Thanksgiving streets would fill up with busy shoppers and tourists. Often times, shoplifters used this chaotic day to make it easier to steal. The term, Black Friday, did not catch on until the ‘60’s. Many stores made attempts to change the name to Big Friday, but this efforts failed. By the 1980’s, Black Friday was a nationally used term; the negative connotation that came with it turned positive.

While the term, Black Friday, has changed from something the police would use into an national day to shop with hefty deals, there is also room to question the psychology behind it. Why do people feel as though they need to get into fights just to get a big screen T.V? And how do stores lure buyers in?

While many people don’t actually search for anything particular on this day,

people enjoy the adrenaline rush they get from shopping. One day a year, people get to go into stores and get into arguments over material items, or run through their favorite stores, yanking items off of racks. Furthermore, many people have Black Friday off from work or school, and often times people have their families over for Thanksgiving. This day, Friday, creates a gap; everyone has this time off, family and friends are in town, and people search for things to do. Many people can get excited about Black Friday simply because it is something to do on a normally lack-luster day.

Often times Black Friday deals are not the cheapest prices for items. So next year, instead of waiting in lines from dusk till dawn, search for the lowest prices for items, look at cyber Monday deals, and relax.