'Black Friday' success prompts retail name game

Hadley Malcolm, USA TODAY

Holiday calendar includes Green Monday, Camo Thursday

If you missed out on the deluge of deals on Black Friday, don't worry. Nearly every day between now and Christmas has been named to give you a reason to shop.

A lot of retailers are playing the name game on various shopping days, hoping to catch the same kind of buzz that Black Friday and Cyber Monday get.

Online retailers kicked off another round of deals and heavy sales with Green Monday this week, named for the amount of money merchants see coming in.

Then there's Dec. 17, Free Shipping Day. And don't forget Camo Thursday, dreamed up by outdoors retailer Gander Mountain in an attempt to drive sales of camouflage apparel every Thursday in December.

While Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the most recognized, in recent years everything from Small Business Saturday to Sofa Sunday have popped up to drive even more sales during the busiest shopping time of the year.

Some have more merit than others, says Scott Krugman, American Express spokesman.

American Express created Small Business Saturday in 2010 to help give its small-business clients a post-recession kick. But it was leveraging an already emerging trend: An overwhelming number of people wanted to support small businesses.

Still, "It takes more than an idea to be a success," Krugman says. "I can't stand here and declare Thursday is going to be Calculator Day and put out a press release and that's it. It needs to be authentic, and people need to get behind it."

For the biggest shopping days, that's what has happened. Others are still waiting to catch on.

The Tuesday after Cyber Monday now has several names: This was the first year of Giving Tuesday, dedicated to charitable donations. And a consumer credit-counseling group also recently named it Red Tuesday, for consumers who racked up credit card debt during the big shopping weekend. They are marketing their services along with the new name.

Sofa Sunday also made its way onto the calendar — it's the day before Cyber Monday when consumers engage in "couch commerce" with their tablet or smartphone.

As mobile and tablet technology lets consumers literally shop wherever and whenever they want, dedicated deals days become less relevant, even as retailers and marketers rush to claim one as their own. PayPal had its biggest mobile-shopping day ever on Cyber Monday this year, until it beat its own record by more than $1 million a week later on Dec. 2 — a Sunday without a shopping moniker.

"The whole retail calendar has changed dramatically over the last two years," says Anuj Nayar, a spokesman for PayPal and eBay. "It's not necessarily matching what consumers are doing now."

Even Black Friday gave up some of its sales to "Gray Thursday" as more retailers decided to open doors Thanksgiving night.

But how much can a deal-crazed nation take? "We will reach a saturation point," says Ellen Davis, senior vice president for the National Retail Federation and the leader behind coining Cyber Monday in 2005. "There aren't too many other days you can squeeze in between Thanksgiving and that following Wednesday, and goodness knows people are trying."

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