The stories say "Black Friday" is looking good. Not good if you are one of those who participated in the anti-consumerist, pro-environment Buy Nothing Day. But, rather, good in the sense that shoppers are filling their carts, which may help boost a battered economy and eventually lead to millions of out-of-work Americans finding a job sooner than would otherwise be the case.

It's possible that the cheerful public demeanor from surveyed shop owners and chain managers may truly reflect an improved situation that will carry on throughout this year's holiday season. But it's always wise to be a bit leery of what we're told immediately after Black Friday. The retailers may actually think sales are going gangbusters. Or they may be whistling in the dark. No matter what the reality, as was pointed out before last season's disaster, the day-after message is always upbeat

A few things you can count on every year around this time:

  1. Sales data for Black Friday will be touted by biased interest groups. They are invariably have an upside bias;

  2. Headline writers will get it wrong

  3. Survey data will be taken as the equivalent of actual sales;

  4. Strong forecasts will be subsequently proven wrong.

For instance, check out this bit appearing on November 30, 2008, from the National Retail Federation:

Though the holiday season is far from over, retailers across the country are breathing a collective sigh of relief after shoppers headed to stores and websites in droves over the weekend. According to the National Retail Federation's 2008 Black Friday Weekend survey, conducted by BIGresearch, more than 172 million shoppers visited stores and websites over Black Friday weekend, up from 147 million shoppers last year.

Here's the dive the 2008 holiday sales actually took.

You can find The Wall Street Journal's more tempered view of how things are going this season in the article Aggressive Bargains Lure Hordes of Shoppers, but They're Still Slow to Open Wallets.

As every veteran retailer will explain, whatever the hype, it's the not the sales results on the day after Thanksgiving that matter most, it's those in the last week before Christmas.

Just in case you're wondering how "the biggest shopping day of the year" got its name, Ethan Trex has the skinny:

If you ask most people why the day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday, they’ll explain that the name stems from retailers using the day’s huge receipts as their opportunity to "get in the black" and become profitable for the year. The first recorded uses of the term "Black Friday" are a bit less rosy, though.

According to researchers, the name "Black Friday" dates back to Philadelphia in the mid-1960s. The Friday in question is nestled snugly between Thanksgiving and the traditional Army-Navy football game that’s played in Philadelphia on the following Saturday, so the City of Brotherly Love was always bustling with activity on that day. All of the people were great for retailers, but they were a huge pain for police officers, cab drivers, and anyone who had to negotiate the city’s streets. They started referring to the annual day of commercial bedlam as "Black Friday" to reflect how irritating it was.

So where did the whole "get in the black" story originate?

Apparently storeowners didn’t love having their biggest shopping day saddled with such a negative moniker, so in the early 1980s someone began floating the accounting angle to put a more positive spin on the big day.

Marketing propaganda. Ain't it wonderful?