Colette Moffroid | A&E editor
December 5, 2025
Black Friday is famously a day of incredible sales and jam-packed stores filled with customers. This shopping day has become an old annual tradition nationwide and is the perfect way to kick off the Christmas shopping season as it falls on the day after Thanksgiving. The name “Black Friday” originated in Philadelphia and was used by police to complain about the influx in shoppers the city would receive on the day after Thanksgiving which required the officers to keep people safe in the large crowds. However, the term took hold in pop culture in the late 198o’s when businesses used it to discuss when their sales moved from being “in the red” to “in the black” in terms of profitability. There is always an increase in sales around the holidays due to the vast amounts of gift shopping that must occur at this time of year. As time went on, stores started to capitalize on this opportunity and turned the day after Thanksgiving into the Black Friday that we now know quite well.
However the Black Friday that took hold of the nation in the 90’s is no longer the one that we get to see today. About
five years ago, I started to notice the sales that had once caused fights to breakout in the aisle of a store were decreasing in percentage every year. This year the sales became so small that there was no longer an abnormal amount of shoppers flooding to the malls on Black Friday. Senior Ireland Lawrence mentioned how she has “stopped going to the mall on Black Friday all together because the sales are just not worth it” or are the same, if not better, online. This decrease in enthusiasm surrounding the Black Friday deals is becoming a trend. On TikTok, the hate on Black Friday is evident. Senior Jayden Smythers noted how she has “seen quite a few comedic videos related to the small percentage sales released on Black Friday this year.” Sales have not only failed to live up to the legacy of Black Friday, but brands have started to mark up their product prices just before releasing a sale to fool their customers into thinking they are getting a great deal, when in reality the sale brings the price back down to its original number. Hopefully Black Friday will be revived in coming years but, unfortunately, this year’s sales while still ongoing through cyber Monday have not been what consumers wanted.
Leave a Reply