They call it Black Friday for several reasons.

Traditionally, the definition of Black Friday is when retailers go from operating in the red to making a profit — or in the black — for the year. That’s an old tradition and it is a wive’s tale. Black Friday these days means anything but profit.

These days Black Friday is a dark day for retailers. General Growth Properties, a major developer of malls and shopping centers, is expanding an initiative to open their centers as early as 12:01 a.m. on Black Friday, much to the chagrin of the weary merchants who rent spaces in their malls.

To GGP, it is all about the hype of “Rockin’ Shoppin’ Eve” and hype is something retailers use to great effect. It is an outrageously long day — a full 24 hours in some markets — that taxes seasonal staffs right out the gate and bogs down inventory flow just as the season is beginning.

Christmas — and hype — are vital to ever getting into the black for the year for most retailers. A retailer these days would love to have 30 straight days of pure profit. But Christmas is more of a two-week season — and if you can’t make it within those two weeks you won’t make it at all in today’s competitive environment. So all the door-busters, the bleary-eyed sales hours and the incredible bargains aim to generate madness and hype first — for profits later.

And that, more than anything else, is what Black Friday is all about. Through smoke, mirrors, red markers and brief glimpses of bargains the name of the game for retailers on Black Friday is to just get you in the doors.

They know that if you can just get there they can plant the seeds for future sales less than 4 weeks hence. The $5 buck toaster looks great at 4am on Black Friday. But maybe you’ll see the deluxe $25 dollar model and think about it for a week or two and get it instead. As the doors open and the crowds rush in it is headgames — not sales — that retailers are really banking on.  

They don’t want you to know that the $300 laptops they have in stock are in very limited supply. They want you to see the $599 model that is just the start in a whole line of laptops they carry.

They don’t want you to know that the $29 microwave has a 30-day warrantee at best and will likely last a few days beyond that if you’re lucky.

They don’t want you to know that their employees hate being there in the dead of night. They don’t want you to know that the employees have been trained on this day to “stack it deep and sell it cheap — just get them in and get them out.” Black Friday isn’t about sales, service and the positive shopping experience. It is about the madness and making the news where the talking heads evaluate the whole season based upon the footage of the rush through the doors before dawn.

How do you maximize your Black Friday dollars?

  1. Get in the stores on Wednesday before Thanksgiving. Look at what they are stacking in the aisles. Evaluate it in person and decide if it is really worth getting up in the middle of the night for it.
  2. Talk to others and find out where they are going. Chances are the big name big boxes are where they are going — WalMart, Penneys, Target, etc. Consider the secondary retailers and the bargains they offer. Fabric stores, hardware stores and other typically smaller retailers have just-as-attractive bargains that you’ll have a better chance at actually getting.
  3. Stay away from electronics, computers and appliances. These high-ticket, high appeal products draw the crowds and cause the biggest disappointments. If you get there early head for clothes, books, food items, furniture and other practical items. Chances are these represent better quality bargains. Electronics and especially computer items tend to be “yesterday’s technology”.  
  4. Talk to the staff. Some won’t tell you how much of any particular product they have — but many will.