When Black Friday comes…

by Mike Orren , April Powell

You've done your patriotic duty by stuffing your face all day. Now it's time to buck up and be a good little consumer by joining the throngs shopping on "Black Friday." (Click the link to learn that the theory you've always heard behind the name is wrong, wrong, wrong.) The outlook for retailers this season is reported to be bleak, probably due to rising fuel prices and the bursting of the housing bubble, but then again, Dallas seems to be doing better than many parts of the country.

Unfortunately (from our point of view), this is a shopping phenomenon that is more traditionally about the big box retailers rather than our local merchants. That said, here's the best (and worst) of the Black Friday deals you'll find around town Friday.

Down in the Bishop Arts District, Make Shop and Studio is offering 20% off all merchandise, fabric and classes purchased in the store. That excludes gift certificates, but they'll add an extra $10 to any certificate you buy. There's free gift wrap and tickets for the Dallas Indie Experience will be available.

British Emporium is hosting its 10th annual "Great British Thanksgivaway." The first 100 customers spending at least $10 get a free goodie bag. They're also throwing out free tickets to some local shows to early arrivers.

Over at Victory, LFT is offering discounts up to 50% on men’s and women’s lines including Ella Moss, John Varvatos, Paul Smith and Twelfth Street by Cynthia Vincent -- plus free gift wrap.

Armhole is offering 30% off everything, including the Custom T-shirt bar.

In the abso-freakin-loutely insane department, you can start shopping at the Outlets at Hillsboro at midnight on Thanksgiving. Ditto the Allen Premium Outlets. Or, set your alarm to be at JC Penney at 4 AM(!?!?). The layabeds can still catch free La Madeline coffee and pastries at NorthPark at 5:30 AM (anticipating most stores opening around 7 AM. Town East Mall opens at 1 AM.

As far as the big retailers go, be wary of the sale items on the front of their flyers. There's a lot of bait-and-switch with limited quantities of insanely low-priced items that you can be sure will be sold out by the time you arrive. Seems everyone's offering $700 off ginormous flatscreen TVs to get you in the door, but only guaranteeing limited quantities. The other big gimmick is offering insignificant gift cards to the first 100 or so customers to brighten the door. We're talking to you, Conn's, Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart, etc. Best Buy does have a cool offer with a free Guitar Hero III pack (including the guitar) for free with an Xbox, but of course they only guarantee 15 per store. And, anyone who's played Rock Band wouldn't care.

Old Navy is offering a free Ipod Shuffle knockoff preloaded with "music."

If you need some quality work clothes, Boot Town/Western Warehouse is offering 20% off Carhartt.

World Market generally has great sales that really are sales. Tomorrow, all holiday stuff and jewelry is two-for-one.

The Great Indoors has 15% off everything, including sale and clearance.

Most assininely annoying ad award goes to The Mattress Firm, who wants you to:

BUY A QUEEN SLEEP NUMBER SET FOR $45!

(per month for 4 years)

To save you from committing the sin of buying a fishwrap edition of a newspaper, here's deeplinks to Macys, Roomstore and Michael's, who both have pretty decent/significant coupons.

As for our Black Friday at Casa OrWell?

In other words, we're celebrating Buy Nothing Day.

Know of other great Black Friday deals? Post them in the comments below.