Why Is Black Friday Called Black Friday? | The Real Origin

The term “Black Friday” was coined by Philadelphia police in the 1950s and 1960s to describe chaotic traffic and crowds before the Army-Navy.

You’ve probably heard that Black Friday marks the day stores finally turn a profit—finally moving “in the black” after a year of red ink. It sounds neat, like a tidy piece of business lore.

That story is a marketing invention from the 1980s. The real tale dates back decades earlier, involves frustrated Philadelphia police officers, and has nothing to do with accounting at all.

Philadelphia Police And A Chaotic Friday

The actual first use of “Black Friday” happened in Philadelphia in the 1950s. Police officers needed a name for the logistical nightmare that hit the city the day after Thanksgiving.

Suburban shoppers flooded downtown streets. Traffic snarled. Sidewalks overflowed. It was a “dark day” for anyone working traffic detail, as The Old Farmer’s Almanac describes the original negative connotation for police and city officials.

In 1961, Philadelphia police officially dubbed the day after Thanksgiving “Black Friday” because of the resulting chaos. The name stuck locally before spreading nationally throughout the 1970s.

The Army-Navy Game Connection

The annual Army-Navy football game, played every Saturday after Thanksgiving in Philadelphia, was a major driver of the crowds. Thousands of fans arrived on Friday, worsening the congestion.

This connection to a sporting event explains why the chaos was unique to Philadelphia for years. It wasn’t just any shopping day—it was a perfect storm of tourists, shoppers, and game-day traffic.

Why The Profit Myth Sticks

The “red to black” accounting explanation is much easier to remember than a story about traffic jams and football fans. That’s why it spread so quickly once retailers started using it.

Here’s what actually happened with the name’s evolution:

• The original meaning was negative: For police, “Black Friday” described a frustrating, exhausting day of crowd control. The “black” referred to trouble, not profit.
• The myth emerged in the 1980s: Retailers invented the “in the black” explanation to make the term sound positive and profitable for their business.
• The “Big Friday” rebrand failed: Philadelphia merchants tried renaming the day “Big Friday” in the 1960s to drop the negative name. It never caught on with the public.
• The 1869 financial panic is unrelated: Some confuse the shopping day with an earlier “Black Friday” from 1869 involving a gold market crash, but that event has no connection to the modern shopping event.
• The myth stuck because it sells: A story about stores becoming profitable is more appealing to shoppers than one about police frustration. Good marketing beat good history.

The myth remains widespread today. Many news articles and shoppers still repeat the “red to black” story without realizing it’s a later marketing spin.

The Timeline Of A Name

The path from Philadelphia police slang to global shopping event took several decades. The first recorded use of “Black Friday” in a retail context dates to the 1950s in Philadelphia.

By the 1970s, the term had spread beyond Philadelphia and was being used nationally to describe the day after Thanksgiving. Per the Walden University article on the Army-Navy football game, the annual matchup was a key driver of the crowds that led police to coin the term.

Today, Black Friday is considered the busiest shopping day of the year in the United States. The term is now used globally by retailers in many countries to denote a day of major sales and discounts following their own local holidays.

The profit story may be a myth, but it’s one retailers successfully sold to the public for decades. Understanding the real history changes how you see the day.

How The Myth Took Over

The “red to black” accounting explanation for Black Friday was invented and promoted by retailers in the late 1980s. Their goal was straightforward: put a positive spin on a negative-sounding name.

Before the rebranding, “Black Friday” still carried the gloomy connotations from its police origins. Stores wanted shoppers thinking about bargains, not traffic nightmares.

1. Retailers borrowed accounting language: “In the red” for losses and “in the black” for profits is standard accounting terminology. Connecting Black Friday to profit made the name sound lucky.
2. Media outlets repeated the new story: The fresh, positive explanation was more newsworthy than the old police story, so newspapers and TV picked it up quickly.
3. The myth became the standard explanation: Within a decade, most Americans believed the “red to black” origin, and the true Philadelphia police story faded from public memory.

Wikipedia notes on its black friday definition that the term now refers to the day after Thanksgiving and traditionally marks the start of the Christmas shopping season. The true etymology is documented separately.

The Global Spread Of A Local Name

What started as Philadelphia slang is now an international shopping phenomenon. Retailers around the world adopted Black Friday sales events, often tying them to their own local holidays.

Black Friday is symbolically seen as the start of the critical holiday shopping season for retailers, according to Investopedia’s economic perspective. The day can represent a significant portion of annual retail revenue for many stores.

The disconnect between the name’s origin and its modern meaning is remarkable. A term coined by frustrated police officers now signals doorbuster deals and early-morning shopping sprees across continents.

The Bottom Line

The true story behind “Black Friday” is more interesting than the profit myth. Philadelphia police coined the term in the 1950s to describe traffic chaos before the Army-Navy football game. Retailers later replaced that negative origin with a positive accounting story that took over the public imagination.

If you’re writing a paper on retail history or business terminology, your school librarian can help you find primary sources from 1960s Philadelphia newspapers. Understanding the gap between real history and marketing spin is a useful skill for evaluating claims beyond just shopping lore.