Six Things You Didn't Know About Black Friday

Black Friday is the biggest shopping day of the year in the biggest economy in the world. Full from their Thanksgiving feasts, millions of shoppers descend on stores across the world on the Friday after the holiday, hoping to save on their Christmas shopping.

But as ever more promotions proliferate -add Cyber Monday and Small Business Saturday to the shopping calendar - the question remains: Just what is Black Friday anyway?

Here are 5 surprising facts you probably dint know about Black Friday.

1. The term 'Black Friday' was originally used to refer to a US stock market crisis in the 1800s.

2. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the day after Thanksgiving grew to become the day the Christmas shopping season officially started in America. This was encouraged by department stores who sponsored Thanksgiving Day parades to push their advertising just before Christmas. It's thought that it became an unwritten rule that no shop would advertise for Christmas before the parade was over.

3. One of the UK's first black Friday events took place in 2003 in a Currys store in London.

4. Police were called to stores across the UK to deal with crowd control, violence and traffic issues during Black Friday sales in 2014.

5. Contrary to popular belief, it's not generally the busiest shopping day of the year. That's usually the last Saturday before Christmas.

6. Black Friday became the biggest shopping day of the year in 2001.

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