Black Friday Evolves Into Black Thursday

With enormous pressure to capture shoppers and generate revenue, retailers are announcing earlier and earlier opening hours for the all-important Black Friday shopping extravaganza. Target will open at 8 pm on Thanksgiving night. To quote a Target senior exec:

For both our guests and team members, Black Friday is an exciting event that officially marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season. By offering advance access to deals at Target.com and opening our stores earlier, we are making it easier for guests to build a Black Friday ritual that works for them.

In other Black Friday news, Kmart is opening on 6 am on Thanksgiving--and its doors won't close for an amazing (or desperate) 41 hours. Best Buy is opening at 6 pm on Thanksgiving.

Black Friday online deals will begin even sooner! Remember, Hanukkah coincides with Thanksgiving this year, which makes the buying frenzy a bit more frenzied.

However, Thursday purchases cut into purchases on Friday, with the result that in 2012, the dollar amount of sales on Black Friday was lower than during the previous few years.

Black Friday may be America's busiest shopping day, but in China, the online e-commerce site Alibaba has made today, November 11th, an incredible day of bargains. The Wall Street Journal says Alibaba rakes in more in this one day of shopping than all US online retailers sell on Black Friday AND Cyber Monday.