Poll: Do you love or loathe Black Friday?

The American phenomenon has Britain's high streets on red alert with staff braced for one of the most lucrative days in the calendar.

What do you think of Black Friday? Vote now in our poll:

For many years, it was common for retailers to open at 6.00am., but in the late 2000s many had crept to 5.00am or 4.00am. This was taken to a new extreme in 2011, when several retailers opened at Midnight for the first time.

The event is synonymous with large queues and even violence - with shoppers pushing, shoving and crushing others in the mad rabble to grab the best deals at the start of the shopping season.

Asda announced that it would not take part in the 2015 Black Friday due to this risk to health despite it being one of the biggest day of shopping in Britain.