Are Black Friday prices the best of the season?
Is it worth camping out to receive Black Friday doorbusters?
The answers to these questions might surprise you. Black Friday, in fact, has spawned many myths and misconceptions over the years, from what it takes to score bargains that morning to how the day was named.
Find out the real truths behind the Black Friday phenomenon.
Myth: Black Friday is the day when retailers move from the red (losing money) to the black (making money).
This is what retailers want you to think, but there's more behind the name. In fact, the earliest reference to the term appears to be the Sept. 24, 1869, stock market panic prompted by plunging gold prices.
In the 1960s, the Philadelphia Police Department used the term Black Friday to describe the day shoppers mobbed downtown and crowded sidewalks. But retailers didn't like the negative connotation, so in the 1980s they pushed the message that they became profitable on Black Friday.
"But the truth is that retailers are red for much of the year," says Richard Feinberg, a Purdue University professor of consumer science and retailing. "They're profitable in the first quarter and the second quarter and the third quarter ..."
Myth: Black Friday is the busiest shopping day of the year for retailers.
Sometimes it is, but most of the time it simply isn't. The Saturday before Christmas usually is the busiest shopping day of the season.
That said, I cannot think of another single day or night when you can find shoppers camped outside a store for hours (if not a few days) waiting for the doors to open. The earliest local lines usually form outside stores on Grape Road, Mishawaka.
Myth: Black Friday shopping is dangerous.
It's not always the free-for-all that the media headlines depict. Scuffles make for great footage, but Black Friday is usually not dangerous and shoppers generally aren't combative. I hear words exchanged and see tempers flaring only when people try cutting in line.
"Consumers are not lunatics willing to hurt, kill or maim to get the best stuff," Feinberg says. "There have been isolated injuries but these injuries are really not greater than injuries in stores throughout the year. They just get more attention on Black Friday."
Myth: There is no good reason to be first in line when the store opens.
Oh, sure there is. Just ask those shoppers who have been first in line at stores like Best Buy and have walked away with huge savings.
Consumers who are willing to brave the elements and camp outside stores for hours -- or days, even -- will tell you how they have been rewarded with special doorbuster prices available only to those who are first in line.
Myth: You have to stand in line for hours to snag the best Black Friday deals.
Not always. You've probably noticed how many retailers are promoting early Black Friday specials online this year, similar or identical to what they will offer at their brick-and-mortar locations today and Friday.