The day after Thanksgiving – also known as Black Friday – has become one of the busiest shopping days of the year in the United States. National retail chains traditionally offer limited money-saving offers on a wide range of goods, in an effort to attract shoppers into stores while offering similar deals online.

Many believe that the term Black Friday is derived from the concept of companies operating at a financial loss, or “in the red,” until the day after Thanksgiving, when the huge sales finally allow them to turn a profit, or “in the black.” However, this is not true.

A more precise explanation of the term dates back to the early 1960s, when police officers in Philadelphia began using the phrase “Black Friday” to describe the chaos that ensued as large numbers of suburban tourists poured into the city to do their holiday shopping. starting and, in some years, attending the annual Army-Navy football game on Saturdays. The enormous crowds caused headaches for police, who worked longer shifts than usual as they dealt with traffic jams, accidents, shoplifting and other problems.

Within a few years, the term Black Friday had taken root in Philadelphia. City merchants tried to give this day a more beautiful face by calling it ‘Great Friday’.

The phrase “Black Friday,” which denoted a positive boost in retail sales, did not grow nationwide until the late 1980s, when merchants began spreading the red-to-black profit story. Black Friday was described as the day stores started making profits for the year and as the biggest shopping day in the United States. In reality, most stores saw their biggest sales on the Saturday before Christmas.

In more recent years, Black Friday has been followed by other shopping holidays, including Small Business Saturday, which encourages shoppers to visit local retailers, and Cyber ​​Monday, which promotes online shopping. Giving Tuesday also originated to encourage charitable donations.

Historically, Black Friday has another connotation, one that has nothing to do with shopping. In 1869, Wall Street financiers Jay Gould and Jim Fisk tried to corner the country’s gold market on the New York Gold Exchange by buying as much bullion as they could, with the intention of sending prices skyrocketing. On Friday, September 24, President Ulysses S. Grant’s intervention caused their plan to fall apart. The stock market immediately plummeted, forcing thousands of Americans into bankruptcy.