Open up a retailer's app or go to their web site, you're likely to be greeted with banners touting "Black Friday" even though that officially doesn't arrive for another three weeks. Stores are using a little shopping psychology to get your money before someone else does.
There's only so much money people can spend, so retailers are racing to get your attention, hoping you'll hit them first for your holiday shopping needs.
"We've got to get the news out, get our names in people's heads, let them come to us first with those limited dollars," is what UNO business professor Mark Rosa says retail businesses are thinking.
He says stores were already talking about Black Friday as far back as August, and even using the phrase as part of their promotion of Halloween sales.
"They were putting those things together as kind of a psychological advertising campaign to plant that seed early enough so it's top of mind for consumers," Rosa explains.
The result is a retail race to get your Christmas shopping money before you can spend it somewhere else.