Confident Consumer: Find deals before Black Friday

Conventional wisdom says some of the best deals of the holiday shopping season are the day after Thanksgiving -- known as Black Friday -- or the following Monday, called Cyber Monday for its online promotions.

And it's often true, depending on what you're buying. If it's a TV or another popular type of electronics, it sure can pay to wait a couple weeks until the post-Thanksgiving long weekend. But for many of the typical holiday gifts, there are great deals to be had now when inventory is plentiful, the stores are less crowded and your stress level isn't so high you'll be making foolish decisions.

Heck, Last Call by Neiman Marcus is selling cashmere gloves right now for $21 plus free shipping. Why wait when you can get that kind of stocking stuffer now?

Many of the big Black Friday promotions have already been announced -- well, "leaked" -- and even more will be on deal websites in the coming days. So if you're worried that early shopping means you'll miss out on deals, you can do your comparison shopping now and decide whether it makes more sense to shop later.

"At this point, half the news has already broken," says Brad Wilson, founder of BradsDeals.com and BlackFriday.BradsDeals.com.

That's good news for anyone who's susceptible to what you might call "emotional shopping." And who isn't when the kids will be heartbroken if they don't get the top toy or you want to get your spouse the perfect something -- super cheap?

Psychologists say giving yourself plenty of time to shop -- and think about purchases -- will help keep stress levels down.

"Shopping late can certainly be a problem like anything that makes you feel like you have to have a rising sense of urgency," says David Forbes, a psychologist who heads Forbes Consulting Group, which counts some major retailers among its clients. "

Along with shopping early and not trying to accomplish too much in one outing, Forbes recommends rehearsing the "what ifs?" That is, "If i don't get it, then what? You could get it tomorrow for maybe $5 more, but maybe that's not so bad," he says.

Best of all, if you're not among those who find Black Friday shopping an exciting tradition, feel free to skip the stores.

"You don't have to go stand in line in the parking lot" soon after you've finished your Thanksgiving dinner, says Wilson. "Black Friday is a great day to shop online."

And Cyber Monday is easily the best day of the year to shop online, Wilson says. The number of coupon codes is up 5% that day, he says. If you stick to cyberspace, sure, you may miss some of the very best, very-limited-quantity doorbuster deals that stores have to draw in the crowds. Such as 2010's $3 toasters at Target or the Sharp LCD HDTV which was on sale for $200 last Black Friday. But most of the rest of the deals that day are both online and in stores. Amazon, Newegg and Overstock also try hard to compete with brick-and-mortar retailers on Black Friday as well, says Wilson.

There are more reasons to shop online or in stores ahead of the mobs.

With people talking, texting and checking prices on their mobile devices, any civility that was left in crowded stores is gone, says consumer psychologist Kit Yarrow. Her pre-holiday interviews in malls and on the phone have detected "more dread about in-person shopping than I have any other year," says Yarrow, a marketing and psychology professor at Golden Gate University.

That dread is well placed. When there is stress caused by surroundings, it "sucks resources from the brain in order to bolster the defensive mechanisms of the body," Yarrow says. And those mechanisms "were designed to help us manage the stress of something like a charging boar -- not the stress of holiday shopping."

This makes it harder to remember a budget or calculate a discount and easier to purchase impulsively. All of this is compounded by the more unruly nature of today's crowds -- now more than ever we're shopping under stress. As if all those lights, smells, memories and time and budget constraints weren't enough!

When possible, wait 20 minutes before buying anything that's not on your list, recommends Yarrow. She says, "That's about how long it takes for rowdy crowds inspired autonomic nervous system arousal to abate."

Yarrow is already finished with her holiday shopping. Her philosophy: "Get it done, get it mailed and enjoy the holidays! Nuff said."

Top 10 deals from BradsDeals.com:

1. 15 Bottles of Wine $90 Shipped

2. Nexus 7 32GB Tablet $229 + $40 Back!

3. Land's End Poplin Shirt $4 Shipped

4. Movado Certe Diamond Watch $625 Shipped

5. 15% off SpaFinder Gift Certificates + Free Shipping

6. Men's Nike Benassi Slides $16 Shipped

7. Canon PIXMA All in One Printer $35

8. UGG Kid's Macie Boots $32 Shipped

9. Swarovski Crystal Earrings $14 Shipped

10. Taste of Home Cookbooks & Kids Books $5

USA Today