Stuff You Should Know - Selects: How Black Friday Works

Episode Date: November 29, 2025

On the day after Thanksgiving, Americans go kind of crazy for the deep discount sales that kick off the holiday shopping season in stores. So crazy, in fact, at least four people have lost their lives and as many as 63 others have been injured during Black Friday sales. But as profitable as Black Friday is, some retailers are thinking about discontinuing the tradition to find ways to make even more money. Learn all about this bizarre, uniquely American holiday custom in this classic episode.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Hey everyone, it's been quite a few years since we dusted off our classic episode on the insanity that is Black Friday. So we thought we put it out there for you again. I'm glad we made this episode when we did because Black Friday's nearly gone away since then. So we kind of inadvertently came up with a document on a fading cultural phenomenon. And I assume historians of the future will rely heavily on this. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this episode. from How StuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and with me, as always,

is Charles W. Chuck Bryant. Jerry's over there. And that makes this stuff you should know. You just checked to make sure Jerry was there. She's very quiet. You literally turned your head and body. Right. Yep, she's there.

I did the Bigfoot thing, though. Like, I had to turn my whole side of my body to look over my shoulder. That's how you know that was real footage. Well, typically when you know Jerry's here, because you can just smell like miso soup or something emanating from our right side. Yeah. Or my right side. Your right side.

But it's not emanating from you. It's coming from Jerry. Yeah. She stinks like miso. Which is actually a very pleasant smell, salty and umami. That's right. So, Chuck. Yes.

Have you ever been to a Black Friday sale? No. No. And I want to say. say h no oh yeah well i mean that's not for me that's a decent qualifier though because it's it's not like an average sale and like if you don't go to a black friday sale uh it's a pretty good reason why is because you're scared well yeah and i i think this is one of those a very divisive topic you're probably either really into going or it's the last thing on earth you would rather do i don't

know a lot of people are like maybe i'll go check out a doorbuster at three a m i think there are people who do have that kind of that idea but maybe not at 3 a.m. Sure there's it's it's almost like a a multifaceted creature like it is for some people like just in the middle of a normal shopping day on the Friday after Thanksgiving they'll go to a store and it's fine and there's some sales or whatever but then you know hours earlier these hardcore people you know who had bathed in the blood or their fellow shoppers well sadly yeah yeah we'll see um had had already come through and gotten all the best deals yeah but and then there's those of us like us who are just like i'm not going out it is literally and i'm not overstating this because people always say literally

when they mean figuratively figuratively but is literally one of the last things i would ever ever do in my life yeah i can't think of many i'd rather go to the dmv than go to a door buster the dmv yeah in between north korea and south korea no no no no that's the dm z right okay i always get those too confused. No, I'd rather go take the last ticket from the DMV and have to wait all day than go to a door buster sale. Yeah. No, I don't play me. All right. So we'll get to more hate spewing about this layer, but... Right, and I should state my opinion. I feel like if this is your thing, that's awesome. Well, true, true. I'm not like cast dispergence on people who disparaging remarks. Is dispersion's a word? Nope, it is now, though. You're like your own, like,

an American dictionary, the New Chuck Dictionary. We should make that. up i like it yeah you could add like five or six words already chuckisms um yeah agreed i'm not saying like pooping people who do it if you're into it great as long as you conduct yourself in a reasonable manner and you don't turn into a monster like others do right and but there is like there are obvious criticisms of the day too which we'll get into but i i think first chuck we should explain what the as you would say h we're talking about to the people who listen to this podcast and don't live in the united states because black friday is much a uniquely American experience it is i think most people probably know but just

very quickly it is the day after thanksgiving now in the united states yeah is known as black friday and we'll get into the pretty interesting history of it but um it's the biggest shopping day of the year right and there are all these crazy specials that they run and we'll get into that as well but quite simply it is the busiest shopping day of the year yeah day after thanksgiving right and um it's it's origins well the origin of the term black friday goes back kind of Kind of a waste, apparently to the mid-20th century, but the idea of going shopping, starting your Christmas shopping on the day after Thanksgiving, actually goes back to the late 19th century, early 20th century, thanks to department stores, like the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Yeah. And as a part of those parades, Santa Claus.

It's no accident. No. It's a Macy's parade. Right, exactly. You know. Yeah. It's still a good parade, though. Have you ever been? No, I haven't.

Yeah, I've never been to the parade, but a couple of times, Emily and I've gone to the day before when they blow up the... Oh, yeah. Which is really neat. Very cool. You mean I have a friend who's actually holding one of the floats or the balloons this year, yeah. Yeah, it's fun to do, although we did it like eight or nine years ago, and it was really neat and sort of crowded, and then we did it a couple years ago, and it is nuts now. Is it? Yeah, it's kind of gone overboard.

Gotcha. The word got out. I think I saw, yeah, I saw something last year in the news. Yeah. Yeah. It's not a place to go if you don't like strollers. Let's just say that. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. Strollers with all-terine tires. Yeah. So, but the idea of starting your Christmas shopping the day after Thanksgiving came from those parades. And they came from those parades because all of those parades pretty much to a parade featured Santa Claus. Yeah, and usually at the end kind of like bringing up the rear. And that means we're kicking it off. That's the official start of the holiday season.

That's right. Santa Claus has made his first public appearance. So from the association of those two came going holiday shopping the day after Thanksgiving. That was in the late 19th century. In the 50s, they think, or early 60s, well, the 50s calling the day after Thanksgiving Black Friday came about, but it didn't necessarily have anything to do with shopping by then. It was from factory owners who apparently coined the term. Yeah, and there's also the other competing theory that it was the day that, it was the day

that stores would go into the black, meaning start to show profit. Right. But that's not quite right, is it? No, so that's a fallacy. That's actually a, well, it's a made-up fallacy to gloss over the original meaning of Black Friday. And it came out of Philadelphia in the 60s, and the cops and the bus drivers and the city workers who worked downtown came up with calling that day Black Friday, because apparently tons of out-of-towners would leave their homes on Thanksgiving, converge on Philadelphia to watch the Army-Navy game on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

But they had a day to kill, so they all started doing their Christmas shopping because there were sales in downtown Philly every year. And the place would be nuts. And this was where Black Friday came from. Apparently the police department wanted to basically keep people away. So they'd be like, well, you don't want to go to downtown Philly. It's Black Friday. Right.

And that was the original reason or origin of the term. Yeah, I see you saw in here an article from the AP in 1975, a sales manager at Gimbles was quoted as saying that's why bus drivers and cab drivers call today, Black Friday. They think in terms of the headaches that it gives them. So I learned something new when I read this. Yeah, and then... I had no idea.

It spread out of Philly. And then years later, the retail lobbies and retailers themselves said, we've got to come up with a better origin story for this, because we want this to be a day that people want to get out of their house and go shopping, you know? But we should point out, even though it is not the day that companies go into the black, as it were, which, by the way, comes from when they did accounting by hand, you would write in red ink or black ink, depending on if you were ahead with money or behind.

Red ink meant you were in the hole. Yeah. Black meant everything's good. Exactly. Even though it does not mean that, the holiday shopping season is, when stores make up between 20 and 40% of their retail profits. It's a lot. Yeah, I mean, even Emily's small business, like the, I don't know about majority,

but a large percentage of her yearly sales are, you know, a couple of months. Yeah. You know? And it's not just her. Apparently, in 2013, the National Retail Federation is predicting that Americans, just in November and December, Chuck, are you ready for this? Yeah. Americans are going to spend $602 billion in November and December.

That's cray. That's a lot of cash in two months. Yeah, I don't spend like I used to on Christmas. Emily and I sometimes will spend on gifts on each other or do that couple thing where you go in and just do something nice for your house. And then like the adults on my side of the family, we don't exchange gifts anymore. Just dirty looks? Yeah.

You exchange dirty looks? No, like my brother and my sister will chip in usually and get my mom something kind of nice. Or give her, offer her a service. Like last year we replaced her fireplace with like a gas fireplace. Nice. Or build her garden fence or tile her kitchen, like something like that. Wow, your mom's got it. Yeah. She's on an easy street is what you call that.

Yeah. But Emily's family, they all still exchange gifts. So I still have my Christmas gift swapping Joan. satisfied you know yes you get your christmas present on yeah okay chuck so um the the idea of shopping after thanksgiving and then black friday that day being called black friday it's been around for a while um and it's a really valuable day yeah that you know it kicks off that two-month period where six hundred and two billion dollars is going to be spent on stuff but it was created like valentine's day it

It was literally created, and then the myth kind of became reality. Yeah. Just because they said, everyone's going to shop today. It's the busiest day, and it became that. Yeah, it wasn't until 2004. Yeah. Usually the Saturday before Christmas was actually the busiest shopping day of the year. Thanks to me.

But the Retail Federation and all the retailers were like, well, we can't just, we can't tout that as the busiest shopping day of the year. We want to get people spending over the course of a couple months, not the Saturday before Christmas so they basically said black friday's the day yeah and it like you said it just kind of became true just from people saying it over time i'm surprised that they haven't come up with a catchy name for like procrastinator's day or something to like pump up that last saturday again or right or to keep you from it so they call it like shame of the nation day something like that to make you like go go do black friday not waiting until the saturday yeah um

So, and there's this website called Black Friday Archive.com. It's actually kind of cool if you like nostalgic ads or whatever. Nostalgia going back to 2007, I should say, but it's just like scans of Black Friday print ads from those years, which are kind of neat. If you're totally bored out of your mind, go check out Black Friday Archive.com. Hey there, Dr. Jesse Mills here. I'm the director of the men's clinic at UCLA Health. And I want to tell you about my new podcast called The Mailroom. And I'm Jordan, the show's producer.

And like a lot of guys, I haven't been to the doctor in many years. I'll be asking the questions we probably should be asking, but aren't. Because guys usually don't go to the doctor unless a piece of their face is hanging off or they've broken a bone. Depends which bone. Well, that's true. Every week, we're breaking down the unique world of men's health from testosterone. gastron and fitness to diets and fertility, and things that happen in the bedroom. You mean sleep?

Yeah, something like that, Jordan. We'll talk science without the jargon and get you real answers to the stuff you actually wonder about. It's going to be fun, whether you're 27, 97, or somewhere in between. Men's health is about more than six packs and supplements. It's about energy, confidence, and connection. We don't just want you to live longer. We want you to live better. So check out the mailroom on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows.

What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Moment, where I talk to artists, athletes, entertainers, creators, friends, people I admire who had massive success about their massive failures. What did they mess up on? What is their heartbreak? And what did they learn from it? I got judged horribly. The judges were like, you're. trash. I don't know how you got on the show. Boo. Somebody had tomatoes. I'm kidding. But if they had tomatoes, they would have thrown the tomatoes. Let's be honest. We've all had those moments we'd rather forget. We bumped our head. We made a mistake. The deal fell through. We're embarrassed. We failed. But this podcast is about that and how we made it through. So when they sat me down,

they were kind of like, we got into the small talk and they were just like, so what do you got? What? What ideas? And I was like, oh, no. What? What? Check out. not my best moment with me, Kevin on stage on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan? Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks.

Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one page business plan for you. Here's the link. But there was no link. There was no business plan. It's not his fault. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet. My name is Evan Ratliff. I decided to create Kyle, my AI co-founder,

after hearing a lot of stuff like this from OpenAI CEO Sam Aldman. There's this betting pool for the first year that there's a one-person billion-dollar company, which would have been like unimaginable without AI and now will happen. I got to thinking, could I be that one person? I'd made AI agents before for my award-winning podcast, Shell Game. This season on Shell Game, I'm trying to build a real company with a real product run by fake people. Oh, hey, Evan. Good to have you join us.

I found some really interesting data on adoption rates for AI. AI agents and small to medium businesses. Listen to Shell Game on the IHeart radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. So Black Friday became a smashing success. Like 2004, 2005, it's a relatively recent thing that it became what it is today here in the States, which is an out-of-control juggernaut. of shopping and consumeristic frenzy, right? But so it was so successful overnight that the retailer said, well, let's figure out ways to extend this whole week.

Yeah. So they came up with Cyber Monday in 2005. Yeah, that's pretty recent. And it is the online shopping version of Black Friday, the Monday after Thanksgiving. And that was another thing they just made up. Another self-fulfilling myth that they said that's the, the workers go back to their computer after Thanksgiving on Monday and they do all of their online shopping. Well, that wasn't really true, but now it is because the retailer said it was and the media reported it. And not to be outdone in 2010, American Express invented Small Business Saturday, which is when you go out and support small businesses with your money.

Especially ones that take American Express. Exactly. so there's it's interesting they're literally creating days to tell people it basically if you're not shopping today you're missing out on really good deals right exactly um and the more days the better as far as retailers are concerned um but there's only so many days after thanksgiving so they started to think recently like well what if we pushed in the other direction rather from Friday on what's behind Friday oh yeah Thanksgiving we can't touch that for shame well starting in 2012 they started touching it Walmart actually um opened at 8 p.m on thanksgiving in 2012 um and there was

there was a general strike called that we'll talk about later yeah because of that because these stores are not supposed to be open on thanksgiving thanksgiving is its own day it's a day of being with family and celebrating and up until 2012 it was sacrosanct. Yeah, this year Macy's and J.C. Penny for the first time

are opening on Thanksgiving and Sears and Toys R Us as well on Thanksgiving evening and Kmart is opening at 6 a.m. on Thanksgiving basically extending Black Friday through the weekend.

41 hours. That's not a day. That's how long Kmart's going to be open. Black Friday at Kmart last 41 hours. yeah that's pretty crazy uh and at shopping malls um you're going to have some smaller stores doing the same thing and estimated 20 to 25 percent will be open at 8 p.m on thanksgiving day and two thirds will open at midnight so essentially what's happening is Thanksgiving evening is being ruined by retail yeah you know yeah i think the retailers would say well you know

we don't have to go right we've seen that people right we've seen that people right we've seen that start lining up Thanksgiving afternoon, Thanksgiving evening, to wait for us to open like that, you know, the next morning. So why don't we just open? So, I mean, I think it's kind of, it goes both ways, but I pretty much see where you're coming from. Yeah, well, this year, it's a little trickier, too, because Thanksgiving comes on November 28th, which is the latest has been in 11 years. Yeah. Is that right? Yeah. 2002? Yeah. So, Weirdly, because they still sort of have to enforce Black Friday, they're actually shortening their own shopping season a little bit this year.

Right. Which is probably why some number opening on Thanksgiving. That's exactly why. It's six days shorter than usual this year. So just by the very existence, by making up Black Friday. They've screwed themselves this year a little bit. They have. By a week.

Yeah, because there's, in other countries like Canada, the UK, the Netherlands, countries that observe the Christmas holidays like we do in America, meaning everybody gives everybody else presents and things like that, and they spend money. But those countries don't have a Black Friday, a day that officially kicks off the holiday shopping season. Those countries spend more over the course of the holiday season because they have a longer period of time to shop.

Yeah. So without Black Friday, in America, the retailers would possibly make more money. So they've definitely painted themselves into a corner by making Black Friday such a thing. And this year it's really kind of pointing out like, oh, we may be shooting ourselves in the foot here. So what can we do?

Well, their solution has been, well, we'll just take over Thanksgiving too. But that's not necessarily sustainable. And there's a lot of people who are saying Black Friday's going to go the way of the dinosaur. Yeah, I read an interesting article in the New Yorker this morning, a finance article, I think it was New Yorker.

It might have been New York Times. But this financial analyst was basically analyzing how the sales go and sort of saying that it's really not financially the smartest approach to take to offer. Shoppers or the retailers? For the retailers to offer these huge deep discounts and sort of blow it out in one day, a better, smarter financial approach would be to elongate the shopping season and not even discount things, maybe even raise prices. and his contention is that they're shooting themselves in the foot right but um i think he's right yeah he probably is but at the same time if you're one of those people like um like me frankly who went to the mall the day after Halloween yeah and saw that the lights were up the garland was out Santa's workshop was ready to go like after Halloween the November 1st wow the place was

totally decked out for Christmas with Christmas carols piping through yeah see that's that's ridiculous but see without but that was the great thing about black friday it's like you you know you had a month of just kind of chilling out everything right ready between between Halloween and thanksgiving then you had thanksgiving and then the holiday season started without black friday it's kind of like this um this dam that's holding back the holiday season yeah from spilling into basically october but with retailers figuring out that it's an impedance to them making money it it probably won't start the official season any longer it'll probably be further back from now on yeah well i think we're in i don't know about well technically slightly in the minority um

in 2013 53 percent of the population of american adults said they will shop on black friday so 53 percent yeah that puts us in the minority by a bit yeah and 2011 152 americans uh shop 52 million oh yeah just 150 but they spent 500 billion dollars yeah 152 really rich americans uh 152 million shopped on that day for an average of three hours at a time which is uh not too long but that's i mean three hours is like oh it's longer than i want to shop ever but uh i saw a woman who did 16 though like a 16 hour stretch of shopping she better have gotten it all done at least. I hope so.

You know? Yeah. Like if she shopped for 16 hours and only got like three gifts. Yeah. It's not time we'll spend. There's also evidence that the internet is basically knocking on Black Friday's door. Thanksgiving Day is the fastest growing online shopping day. Yeah.

And I think like 70% of the people who said that they're going to shop on Black Friday said they'll do some or most of it online. Right. So the internet's still there for retailers to make money. But the idea of Black Friday in-store sales going extinct is probably not going to happen because it's its own thing. Like there's this one consumer psychologist or consumer analyst, I think, pointed out that it's a tradition, number one. Now it is. And number two, there's a certain element of like sport to it. It's more than just getting a good deal.

It's like, you know, throwing a fist at somebody. while you get a good deal. There's something to it that transcends the whole thing. So we mentioned door busters. It's a central part of the cog that is Black Friday. And it goes back in print,

believe it or not, to the year 1917 and anecdotally to 1895, wherein a retailer will basically say, you know what, we have one item, or usually it's a few now, but some really deep,

deep and really super great deals on just a few select items. So, like, for example, a good laptop for $180. Yes. And, like, deals like the iPods for half off or a TV for, like, 200. Like, really, really, like you said, very good discounts. But here's the deal. It's a scam, people.

Oh, it's a bait and switch scheme. It's a bait and switch. They've only got a very limited amount of these select items, which is why the violence happens, which we'll get to in a minute. And then after that, they're hoping you get in there. you don't get that laptop but you're like screw it i'm at walmart at five a m i might as well buy some stuff regular priced yeah or slightly discounted items um and you know that's how they get you in the store that's how they get you it is um and it is it's true that there these items do exist and they are

for that deal they're they're they're for that price i should say um but there's only like 10 and in the fine print it's like one per person and that deals is for in stock only like you can't get a rain check or anything like that but the concept that these deals do exist for those items that are in the store coupled with whoever physically gets their hands on that item first gets that deal

leads to doors actually being busted it's called recipe for disaster yeah all right so before we get to the the dark days and the bad stuff that can happen, truly. Let's do a little message break. Okay. Stuff you should know. Hey there, Dr. Jesse Mills here.

I'm the director of the men's clinic at UCLA Health. And I want to tell you about my new podcast called The Mailroom. And I'm Jordan, the show's producer. And like a lot of guys, I haven't been to the doctor in many years. I'll be asking the questions we probably should be asking, but aren't. Because guys usually don't go to the doctor unless a piece of their faces hanging off or they've broken a bone.

Depends which bone. Well, that's true. Every week, we're breaking down the unique world of men's health, from testosterone and fitness to diets and fertility and things that happen in the bedroom. You mean sleep?

Yeah, something like that, Jordan. We'll talk science without the jargon and get you real answers to the stuff you actually wonder about. It's going to be fun, whether you're 27, 97, or somewhere in between. Men's health is about more than six packs and supplements. It's about energy, confidence, and connection.

We don't just want you to live longer. We want you to live better. So check out the mailroom on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite shows. What up, y'all? It's your boy, Kevin on stage. I want to tell you about my new podcast called Not My Best Month, where I talk to artists, athletes, entertainers, creators, friends, people I admire who had massive success about their massive failures. What did they mess up on? What is their heartbreak?

And what did they learn from it? I got judged horribly. The judges were like, you're trash. I don't know how you got on the show. Boo, somebody had tomatoes. I'm kidding. But if they had tomatoes, they would have thrown the tomatoes. Let's be honest.

We've all had those moments we'd rather forget. We bumped our head. We made a mistake. The deal fell through. We're embarrassed. We failed. But this podcast is about that and how we made it through. So when they sat me down,

And they were kind of like, we got into the small talk. And they were just like, so what do you got? What? What ideas? And I was like, oh, no. What? Check out not my best moment with me, Kevin on stage, on the Iheart radio app, Apple podcast, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan?

Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks. Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one page business plan for you. Here's the link. But there was no link. There was no business plan. It's not his fault. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet.

My name is Evan Ratliffe. I decided to create Kyle, my AI co-founder, after hearing a lot of stuff like this from OpenAI CEO Sam Aldman. There's this betting pool for the first year that there's a one-person, a billion-dollar company, which would have been like unimaginable without AI and now will happen. I got to thinking, could I be that one person? I'd made AI agents before for my award-winning podcast, Shell Game. This season on Shell Game, I'm trying to build a real company.

with a real product run by fake people. Oh, hey, Evan. Good to have you join us. I found some really interesting data on adoption rates for AI agents and small to medium businesses. Listen to Shell Game on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Stuff you should know.

All right, let's go back a little bit to 2008. And probably the, well, I was going to say the darkest incident, but I think the Toys R Us may be darker. I think this one's darker because so many people were involved, yeah. Yeah, that's true. All right, 2008 in Valley Stream, Long Island. It was at a Walmart, and it was 5 p.m. on Thanksgiving. So basically people there the day before, it wasn't one of those days where it was open on Thanksgiving.

So they're to wait until 5 a.m. So at least 12 hours ahead of time, there were about 1,000 people already set up there. Some people are camping out in tents. They're waiting. They got their coffee. probably slug in some gym beam to warm the belly. And so the police came out and said, you know what, let's set up a buffer zone, a barricade, which worked until about 2 a.m. When that was breached. And the cops basically said, we're out of here. This isn't part of our job.

Yeah, the crowd had turned angry a little bit after that. So one of the store employees had some family members come and like they took them out of the line and took them in the store. Not a good idea. Yeah, but even if everyone in the crowd would have been cool with it, I don't think everybody in the crowd realized that they were family members of an employee. Sure. So the crowd actually turned like ugly. Yeah, they broke through the barricade and were squeezed against, you know, how the stores have the entrance

and then that little glast and vestibule area before, and then usually a second entrance to get into the store itself. So there was about, by this time there was about 2,000 people waiting for the store to open. And it was 4 a.m., the store was going to open at 5. And a couple hundred were in between this little buffer zone and those front exterior doors. Yeah. And being pressed up, literally crushed to death. And there's this fascinating article in The New Yorker

by a guy named John Seabrook called Crush Point. And it's about not just this incident, but just crushings in general where a crowd can crush somebody. Yeah, we covered that like years ago. It seems like it. Yeah, totally. But anyway, you check out that article. Yeah, people literally yelling, pushed the doors in, chanting this.

And just before 5 o'clock, it's a pretty bad scene. And workers in that vestibule area realized that there was a pregnant lady named Leanna Lockley being crushed against the doors. And so they're like, we've got to get this lady in here, open the doors enough to squeeze her through. She got in. And then the crowd surged forward. And it just kind of went downhill from there. and they still did the 10-9-8 countdown. Isn't that mind-boggling?

It's mind-boggling that they didn't. Well, first of all, that the cops left. Yeah, they said apparently in a court deposition that the cops, when they left, said controlling this crowd's not in our job description. Good luck. Walmart had hired a security force of two for the event. One person hadn't shown up. The other one was inside the store, not helping.

So they got a bunch of their stock guys, their biggest dudes that they could find, and said, come stand in his vestibule. and help anybody who like falls down or if that's when I would have been like dude that's not in my job description exactly well they didn't say that and when the doors finally opened after the festive countdown while these people were being crushed against the front unbelievable the doors started to open and right when they opened they actually gave way and were literally busted by this wave of humanity yeah and at that point the employees their little red rover line was completely ineffective people are getting knocked down some of the workers are getting blown out of the way some are jumping on vending machines

it's ridiculous yeah a couple of them like climbed up the coke machine get out of the way for safe harbor one guy who was in the in the way of the crowd when the doors gave way

this article by John Seabrook puts it that he was blown back so again there's a vestibule there's the outer doors there's the vestibule and then there's inner doors and then there's the store this guy got blown from the outer doors all the way through the vestibule through the inner doors into the store by this wave of people 2,000 people yeah just coming in all at once all trying to get their hands on that door buster yeah like an iPod or something yeah so that's not the end of the story sadly um people are getting crushed this pregnant

uh trips over some old woman she's on the ground at this point pregnant yeah leanna lockley in danger of being you know trampled to death and then she somehow managed to get to her knees and saw an employee do you know how to pronounce his first name Jim Tay D'Amour Jim Tay D'Amour he was assigned to help people in case anyone fell fell down next to her the doors fell on top of him

and 2,000 people trampled over those doors and killed him yeah he was trampled to death he died of asphyxiation being crushed under the door and he was a stock guy at 6 a.m., 6.03 a.m. he was pronounced dead one hour after the festive countdown to let people get in to shop and that was at the hospital an hour later so he most likely died on the scene um and pretty awful what's crazy chuck if that story is not bad enough tramplings are actually really common yeah and like somebody might not die you might not be asphyxiated and he might not have died had he not gotten caught under the door

door but the people getting knocked down if you want to see this just go on to youtube and type in black friday not even black friday tramplings just type in black friday and you will see tons of compilations of store security footage of people coming in right when the store opens on a black friday sale just climbing over one another knocking each other down some people help other people up or drag them out of the way or whatever but just as frequently people just climb over the ones who are down for a sale it's it's insane i seriously encourage everybody to go check out some video of it yeah i can't believe that after this incident that there wasn't a law pass outlawing outright black friday sales you know that is not happening well but it's ridiculous

because there's it's economists and analysts have proven that you can have like even it's not like they'd lose money they would probably make more money if they didn't have these blockbuster sales. So it's not like they could say, well, like, you're keeping me from doing my business. Right. I don't know. I just can't believe they can't outlaw something like this.

So that was a pretty horrendous example of a crowd crush and a trampling. Yeah. But other things do happen. You mentioned the Toys R Us in Palm Desert, California, a couple of years back, right? Yeah, that was in 2008. These two women got in a fist fight,

and then their husbands got into it. And basically, first of all, these two men were carrying guns into a Toys R Us to Christmas shop which is a little weird and they started a shootout with each other basically

and not a very skilled one apparently I read about it like one guy forgot to cock his gun the other guy like his didn't work either so they start chasing each other through the store

shooting at each other yeah luckily no one else died but those two gentlemen shot each other and died and a Toys R Us because of their wife's gotten a fist fight. Yeah. On Black Friday, I did Toys Arrest during Christmas shopping.

I'm surprised no one else if they're running through the store shooting. I think everybody cleared out of their way. Yeah. I know I wouldn't follow them around and be like, hey, guys, where are you doing? Where's the door busters? In 2011, a woman at a Los Angeles Walmart pepper sprayed some people in the video games. Initially, the cops thought, well, this lady was some Black Friday jerk. Which would make her a pretty awful person.

Yeah, but apparently the real story is, and she actually got out of it, was that her children were attacked, punched, kicked, thrown to the ground by shoppers trying to get an Xbox from these children. And so she defended her kids by pepper spraying these jerks. Right, and this thing still hasn't been settled. The most recent thing I saw was that a year on, so last year, the cop still hadn't filed charges. So I guess they believed her story. But she shopped anyway after that happened and bought her items. So she pepper sprays a bunch of people, affects 20 people, causes a bit of a trampling, pandemonium.

And then two horrible things happened after that. One, like you said, the lady took her kids and her items and went to the store and checked out, bought her stuff. Second, the people outside the immediate circle where she pepper sprayed, but still in that little area, stuck around, still tried to get their hands on the sale item. Yeah, they're like checking out and their eyes and nose are watering. Yeah. Just ring it up. Let me get home. Yeah.

And then, of course, Chuck, there's the workers as well. Well, yeah. I mean, no one wants to work on Thanksgiving. And this year, like we said, a lot of retailers are opening on Thanksgiving. And there's really not anything they can do about it if they want to keep their job. Right. Which is really sad. And Walmart employees planned a strike, I think, last year in 2012.

And it didn't work. only 26 of the 4,200 stores reported striking employees. So for fear of losing their jobs, probably they had to come to work anyway. Well, Kmart in particular was criticized this year for opening at 6 a.m. on Thanksgiving. Yeah. And Kmart said, these people don't have to work. Like, we're not forcing them to work. And their critics are saying, well, actually, that's not necessarily true because you're using part-time seasonal employees.

And there's no federal mandate that those people have to have holidays or time off. Right. so therefore they're in a position where they either work or you can fire them legally yeah uh so they kind of do have to work so there's a lot of ugliness on black friday but chuck if you are just the average normal person like my brother-in-law loves to go to black friday shopping and he'll like go at midnight yeah go to the the doorbuster sales but he's like he's not crazy well the majority of them don't end in violence because this happens all over the country and these are isolated incidents so it's not like at every doorbuster sale you're going to get trampled but there is a risk there is and um the people you want to look out for apparently there is a study of consumer behavior at black friday sales and it was a legitimate study um sure it said that you want to look out for the people who have done a lot of planning yeah yeah they exhibit the most antisocial behavior like shoving pushing right yelling like they've got their plan in place exactly and nothing's going to alter that and they feel like they've really

put the time in and they're not about to lose that door bust ride. To some jerk who's never done it before and just showed up. Who just lucked into line or whatever. You know, like, remember the famous Who concert in the 70s where the people were trampled? Yeah, that's in that New Yorker article too.

They got rid of general admission seating after that. Like, why can't they do something about this? You know, I think the law stepped in and said, wait a minute, you can't just open the doors to a concert venue and say, first one in gets front row. Are they still General Admission?

Not for big arena shows. Oh, yeah, no. Yeah. Well, you know that there was like just one door open and like four others locked. Yeah. And people were getting crushed up

against the locked doors and the people inside who are working at that concert like just never opened the doors even though people were dying. I can't remember what we cover that in, man. It's so like vivid in my mind from way early on

because we studied the the science of crowd surges I don't know what it was either because this article's not that old it's just like a year's old. No it definitely wasn't about this I had to do with something else but yeah

dirty bad stuff or you can take another approach. Yeah this is a different approach you could say in the 1990s an artist named Ted Dave gave birth to what's now called Buy Nothing Day wherein people are encouraged to not buy anything for 24 hours

and to fight the power in consumerism uh by not showing up at all and not just fight the power the guy who created ted ted dave he's a vancouver guy who came up with it in the 90s um it was also not just to stick it to the man which i can only imagine if nobody bought anything in america on black friday what kind of crippling effect that would have on the economy yeah but he was also saying personally it's that's a good day to not buy anything and be take stock sure of how much you do maybe waste or spend or whatever just think about your consumer your consumerism for one day

dirty hippie and during that time like don't buy anything and don't gas up your car the night before don't get a bunch of milk the night before like just yeah just be normal and on one day of the year don't buy anything and that's buy nothing day and it's kind of become this big thing ever since abusters the people who gave us occupy wall street right kind of found out about it and adopted it and just took the whole thing worldwide. It's pretty amazing. It is. So if you go to a Black Friday sale

and you see a bunch of people dressed as zombies, they're making fun of you. They're making fun of zombie consumers. Same with the people who are dressed as sheep. Yeah. And then there's zente claws. Maybe I'll do that. Maybe I'll dress up as a sheep.

Yeah, and just walk around and bah in people's faces. Yeah. And then if in there, I might pick up a laptop. Right. There's also credit card cut-up stations. Yeah, yeah, where you, and get rid of your credit card and she's

shukas consumerism. Yeah. And then there's the, my favorite, the, what is it, the Whirley gig conga line?

Oh, I haven't heard of that. Is that to disrupt shoppers? The whole point is to just kind of serve as a mirror, I think,

to people. Like, look at yourselves, you're ridiculous. You think I look stupid? You're the one that looks stupid. Right. We're not even buying anything.

But yeah, so it's kind of a twofold thing. It's one like, just kind of acting personally slash sticking it to the man as an individual consumer like realizing your power in the grand scheme of things is all kind of hinges on you spending your money and if you don't then you're taking the power back or pointing out to other people just how ridiculous they're being at consumers as consumers people probably be like where'd you get that cheap costume right exactly

what all was that on so I've got one last thing uh I noticed the other day I'd never heard of this before in china you think we like to shop chinese love to shop and they have something that they have created called singles day okay and it is on november 11th so 1111 the four ones stand for single people and they're basically like hey because in china i think you're encouraged to marry so this is like hey be single go out and treat yourself to something online and buy something because it's singles day and you should celebrate being single really and it's a huge deal they spent Well, this e-commerce platform in China called Alibaba is the one who really got behind it recently. And they spent $5.7 billion on Singles Day this year, which dwarfs Cyber Monday by three times almost.

Wow. And it's the biggest online shopping day in the world. And in the first six minutes this year, just a couple of weeks ago, they spent $160 million in the first six minutes online in China. Just to celebrate being single And they're encouraged to shop for themselves Which I don't think we pointed out A lot of people on Black Friday When

When asked Say they do some of the shopping for themselves It's not all gifts It's like I want that laptop I think 47% or 41% of people Who said they're going to shop on Black Friday So they'll do most of the shopping for themselves I usually do that

Whenever I go out like genuinely Christmas shopping I'll pick up something for myself Well these people are saying they're mostly shopping for themselves. No, I don't, mostly, but I'll just, I'll just treat myself to a little something. A little something modest. And I want to say, Chuck, we're not,

we don't begrudge anybody going to Black Friday sales. If that's your thing, enjoy it, that's fine. Just act like a human being. Yeah, don't take anyone's life. No. Don't trample over somebody

who's falling down. And most importantly, have a very nice Thanksgiving. Enjoy the people you're with. Yeah. Whether they're friends, family, old acquaintances, new acquaintances, take some time to really enjoy this Thanksgiving day and relax and just be.

I agree, my friend. Yeah, it's Thanksgiving, be with your family, turn off your smartphone, maybe even. Wow. Really get crazy and just be in the moment. Yeah. How about that? And we give you permission to shout down anybody who says that a triptophan is what makes you sleepy. That's right.

You go ahead and send them straight. Yep. Happy Turkey Day, Americans and other parts of the world, whatever you're doing. I hope you're well. Yeah. Nice, Chuck. And Chuck, we should say that, as usual, if everyone wants to send us happy Thanksgiving wishes,

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