Who coined the term "Black Friday" and when does the UK celebrate Black Friday, if they do?

I-is-smart

I don't think they officially get one in the UK since it's the day after our Thanksgiving (just a regular day of the week for those folks). However, Apple is supposedly declaring Dec 1st as Black Friday in the UK. But, who knows how many companies/stores will actually participate in this unofficial declaration. Nov 21 07, 12:05 AM

jed_junior

Sept. 24, 1869, in U.S. history, day of financial panic, Government gold released onto the market, mayhem etc etc. But, we don't celebrate a day called "Black Friday" to my knowledge in the UK, unless there is a specific regional event. Nov 21 07, 12:18 AM

McGruff

Haven't found a specific who, but here is why and possibly where: The earliest uses of "Black Friday" refer to the heavy traffic on that day, an implicit comparison to the extremely stressful and chaotic experience of Black Tuesday (the 1929 stock-market crash) or other black days. The earliest known references to "Black Friday" (in this sense) are from two newspaper articles from November 29, 1975, that explicitly refer to the day's hectic nature and heavy traffic. The first reference is in an article entitled "Army vs. Navy: A Dimming Splendor," in The New York Times: Philadelphia police and bus drivers call it "Black Friday" - that day each year between Thanksgiving Day and the Army-Navy game. It is the busiest shopping and traffic day of the year in the Bicentennial City as the Christmas list is checked off and the Eastern college football season nears conclusion. The derivation is made even more explicit in an Associated Press article entitled "Folks on Buying Spree Despite Down Economy," which ran in the Titusville Herald on the same day: Store aisles were jammed. Escalators were nonstop people. It was the first day of the Christmas shopping season and despite the economy, folks here went on a buying spree... "That's why the bus drivers and cab drivers call today 'Black Friday,'" a sales manager at Gimbels said as she watched a traffic cop trying to control a crowd of jaywalkers. "They think in terms of headaches it gives them." Both articles have a Philadelphia dateline, suggesting the term may have originated in that area. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_%28shopping%29 Nov 21 07, 8:50 AM

mikey97532

We have a Black Friday in the UK, however it is a totally different context. Black Friday here is the last Friday before Christmas, a lot of people who work in Monday to Friday jobs will go out on this day after work and drink way too much. It is the busiest day of the year for two of our emergency services (police and ambulances.) I'm not entirely sure where the phrase came from, but essentially we do have a Black Friday and it's not something we celebrate, it's just something that happens, and most people will regret how much alcohol they drank the day after... lol Dec 19 08, 11:13 PM

Baloo55th

I've never heard it called that - and I was in a quite happy state last night... Company celebration - still going on when GingeryNutt collected me. Members here might be interested to know that in the picture quiz Baloo scored three and a half celebrities. He knew it was a Gallagher but put Liam instead of Noel, or vice versa. One of the girls from Accounts won with 15. There again, they might not be interested. Dec 20 08, 2:32 PM