Happy “Day After Thanksgiving,” or as the more modern cool kids call it, “Black Friday.”
I prefer to call it what it is: The Day After Thanksgiving.
Advertising of the modern day (post-2000) advertises the day after Thanksgiving as “Black Friday,” but before that, it was never referred to by that name. I’ve also seen advertisements that refer to the sales as “Early Bird Specials.” And no store advertised themselves as being open on Thanksgiving (except for a few Chicago-area Zayre’s advertisements from the late 1980s I came across earlier this week). You know how early these sales started? 7 or 7:30 am at the earliest. That’s right, you want something heavily discounted? You’re waiting until 7 am (7:30 am at the latest) for those discounts.
Today, we move away from 1986 and JC Penney’s After Thanksgiving Sale,to 1995 and discount retailer Marshalls treatment of the Day After Thanksgiving. So what does Marshalls have to offer us today, beginning at…
But what kinds of cool stuff is on sale?
Why…
Ugly sweaters when they weren’t considered ugly sweaters. One for you, and one for your poor child. TWINNING!!!!!
(That is a kid, right? That awful, poofy mid-1990s hair and Mom Sweater make it hard to tell!)
On a sidenote, I had several now-tacky sweaters in my late teens that I wore to my temporary greeting job during the holidays. You’ll never catch me in them again unless I’m going to an Ugly Sweater Party, which will never happen because I still remember when these were mainstream and acceptable to wear. I used to wear them with my black skirt, black tights, and my chunky-heeled Mary Jane shoes. I LOVED my chunky-heeled Mary Jane shoes. I followed them up the following year with something more sophisticated (I was a senior in high school and it was 2000, after all)…
They’re not the exact ones I had, but super close. I loved my l.e.i. clog loafer hybrids, and I wore them to school almost everyday, especially with jeans. Did that mean bringing sneakers to school for gym? Well, yes, but worth it! I was eighteen and I was all about sophistication.
Seventeen years later, I wear fake Uggs to work pretty much everyday because they keep my feet warm. And if I wear a dress, it is because the temperature got above 70.
And because I was so high on fashion (well, I just actually REALLY liked hair accessories), I wore my awesome barrettes to pin my hair back. Let me tell you, if I could get away with that today, I would. I still wear a barrette once in a while, but it wasn’t my awesome silver ones with the jeweled butterflies on it.
But enough of that, what about…
And…
These will be great for a cold night…
And for a windy day…
The wind has nothing on this quad!
And every home wanted one of these…
OMG, 1995, you are awesome! But pictures don’t do it justice. Click play, see the magic of 1995 Day After Thanksgiving bargains!!
Oh Marshalls…
‘Tis the season indeed!
I even love that these commercials didn’t give the feeling of “you NEED to be shopping the day after Thanksgiving!” They gave you the sales and didn’t have all the force and pressure behind their words. The best advertising doesn’t force itself on you, but rather, gives you enough persuasion to buy/participate in something.
And a store that doesn’t open until 7 am the day after (and not be open on the actual holiday)? The best kind of store, if you ask me. Why have we become so consumer-driven that we put the needs of the purchaser above the needs of the people selling the goods?
I miss 1995.
Oh, and two for two. Marshalls and JC Penney are both still in business to this day!
On that happy note, let’s close out Flashback Friday. Mostly because I’ll start going off on a bigger rant about stores encouraging mob crowds and survival of the fittest. No one wants to read that. They want to go shopping instead.
For wind breaker suits!
Ain’t nothing getting past this group. Wind be damned!
Have a fantastic Flashback Friday, and a great weekend!