I would attribute a good bit of it to a general hostility towards Black Friday in general. A lot of people (myself included) have realized that it’s not worth the hassle of dealing with the crowds, regardless of the savings involved. I went once, and it simply doesn’t add up.
Yup. I gave up when in one store I couldn’t even get to the end of the line: whenever I got to where the end was, it had already stretched to the other end of the store. Then trying to do that store after store... Just not worth it.