EXPLAINER: What you should know about Black Friday

By Genevieve Aningo

From the month of February, the world would be celebrating Black History Month and the concept of Black Friday is one of the historical events that emanated from the Black Americans.

However, In today’s digital and advanced world, the phrase Black Friday has become the most excellent familiar lyric used by online vendors to revamp their sales records.

It is an antidote to soothe a bad company’s sales record and increase patronage.

On a Black Friday, online vendors and traditional sales firms offer steep discounts on their goods and services. These sales business companies peg less to a product, different from its original price.

That makes a product more affordable than its high price. This also enables them to sell off old stocks of goods no longer in demand.

No doubt, this wise tactic has proven effective in luring and converting individuals to customers. More global business-to-consumer (B2B) sales platforms such as Amazon, Ebay, Shopify, etc., apply this open secret to make more sales.

It is like a wand of magic in their hands, potent enough to make a frugal hand itchy to roll out some dollar notes. The juicer the offer, the more converts.

Officially, Black Friday starts after the United States thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday in November. The holiday enables American citizens to kick off the holiday merriment in the spirit of Thanksgiving.

What is a holiday without splurging on gifts and craved items? So businesses leveraged this holiday and introduced Black Friday as people are prone to spend more during a time of rest. It’s simply a holiday shopping season. Some retailers even upstage Black Friday earlier in their sales plan before November.

However, the popular framing of Black Friday to suggest a cheap deal offer in business was not so decades ago. The obsolete meaning of Black Friday was linked with days of economic stress, the pretense of being sick, and over labour.

In essence, Black Friday denoted financial loss in the past as opposed to today when such means gains for business dealers.

First, the term was conceived in the United States on 24th September 1869 when a business deal crashed. Two business gurus, financier Jay Gould and railway owner James Fisk tried to corner the gold market. A substantial financial risk created panic as the trade fell off. So black connotes negatively.

Another fascinating insight was that centuries ago, Black Friday was a sincere negative connotation of black. Black is embellished with the emotion of misfortune, disaster and sorrow. Then in the 1950s, after the Thursday Thanksgiving celebration, factory workers failed to resume on the next day- Friday.

Most workers called in sick to still hang on to their holiday mats. Due to the widespread sick calls from workers,’ the day was tagged –Black Friday. Likewise, some Philadelphia cops in 1960, who worked for extended hours on a Friday preceding the Thanksgiving Day, deemed that Friday to be termed- Black. They found the 12 hours outstretched working duration overbearing.

Regardless of the 1980s, business owners scanned their records in the usual black and red column on a Friday after Thanksgiving Day to spot losses and profits. They discovered that the black columns had more entries and ultimately more profits.

That discovery transformed the negative implication of what Black Friday means in today’s society. From a day of playing, telling a little lie to miss work, or dread the extra job hours to a day for extravagant shopping. Therefore to maintain more records in black ink, business owners began offering affordable prices to goods and services to attract more sales during the Thanksgiving festivities.

Today, the Black Friday culture has been adopted globally by business owners to keep the credit alert tone constant. In the case of traditional shopping, it is used to lure troops of customers into the stores. Aside from November, which is the month of Thanksgiving, Black Friday can be used by businesses any time of the year.

As we await the Black history month ( every February), tell us other renowned Black American history events that have shifted their meaning in today’s world. Let us read your comments!