The day after Thanksgiving has been the beginning of the holiday season since the late 19th century. This because President Abraham Lincoln designated that the last Thursday of November would become the Thanksgiving holiday. The term “Black Friday” was only first seen in 1966.   

But why the term “Black Friday”? The Friday part of the term seems pretty obvious, considering thanksgiving is always set on a Thursday, therefore the following day being Friday.  

However, I was always intrigued why was it named black? For many years, shoppers would invade malls and shops the day after thanksgiving, retailers ended selling enough goods to make a profit to cover the rest of the year.   

 Since in accounting, the use of the color black is equal to profit, when recording the book entry for the Friday after thanksgiving, it was always in black; therefore, the term became “Black Friday”.