Black Friday and Boxing Day sales have become a months-long discount season

Black Friday and Boxing Day are marketed as single‑day events with dramatic price drops, yet the reality is that these sales now stretch well beyond one day. These events have slowly transformed from a one-day bargain bonanza into a long season of discounted prices.

“Deals now tend to start around October and extend into early January,” says Vivek Astvansh, an Associate Professor of Quantitative Marketing and Analytics at McGill Desautels. Twenty years ago, people would stand in line in the cold to get a great deal.  Astvansh himself used to line up with friends.

“We would have popcorn with us, coffee. It was beautiful, but the world was very different back then. There were no online sales…and the retailers also celebrated that one day with us.”