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Merrick, NY—From the entire Centurion team, best wishes for a happy Thanksgiving and a prosperous and successful holiday selling season. 

Did you know that prior to 1939, Thanksgiving Day was always the last Thursday in November? That year, in an effort to appease merchants who wanted a longer selling season, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt officially changed Thanksgiving Day from the last Thursday to the fourth Thursday in November instead. While the calendar doesn’t always work out to the merchants’ favor, it does give an extra week at least every few years—and it did help ingrain the idea of extending the shopping season earlier and earlier.

But even as far back as 1906, the U.S. Consumer’s League launched a campaign to encourage people to shop early for holiday gifts. Its purpose, however, wasn’t to encourage more consumerism, but rather to try and lighten the load on retail clerks, postal workers, factory workers, and delivery boys during the holiday season. (Child labor laws, not especially stringent to begin with at the time, also were most likely to be abused during the holiday season.)  

But what sparked today’s mad frenzy of Christmas commercialism, to the point where people even have been injured or killed in the dash for a deal? And where did the term “Black Friday” really come from? (Hint: It’s not because retailers turn their first profit for the year, as many believe.) This article on Fashionista.com gives an interesting history of holiday shopping in America from the 1880s through Cyber Monday and more. Click here to read more.