By any measure I am a most fortunate woman. I have enough money, possessions and love in my life to make me happy and enough equanimity and trust that I don’t worry about lack. So I don’t judge consumers who are hungry for a bargain, any bargain. Is it a sad state of affairs when people swap or shorten a day with family and friends to stand on line waiting for a new toy? Sure it is. But I don’t walk in their moccasins so I can’t judge.

What I do understand however, is retail numbers. Hard numbers. And no matter how many ways I look at the “Grey Thursday ” (ugh… an apt description if there ever was one) phenomenon, I cannot make sense of it from the Retailer perspective. I know there were lines on Thanksgiving. I’ve seen photos and videos and heard many anecdotes and stories. But what about Black Friday itself? Were those lines and sales incremental to Black Friday or did we just move the sales around? Were we just making a lot of noise but creating more uncertainty for ourselves?

Before I go into the details of my journey I would like to ask our retailer readers a question. Did Thursday opening really deliver more in gross margin dollars than it cost you for payroll? When we look at the numbers at the end of the year will we see the ‘expected’ boost in sales, coupled with a bit of a nick on SG&A? Did we create an uncomfortable environment for our employees for nothing? Did we encourage our customers to exchange a day of gratitude for grasping? Did they exchange family for frenzy? And seriously… was it worth it? My goal this year was to attempt to empirically figure it out. Fortunately, epic Miami weather made for a fun drive.

First stop: Midtown Miami. Now, this is interesting for a variety of reasons. The anchor stores in this relatively new shopping zone are currently Target, Ross Stores, PetSmart, Marshalls, Payless Shoes, West Elm and others. But it’s also a burgeoning arts district -it’s a magnet for an interesting mix of people. It’s also a place Walmart really wants to be. The giant has been lobbying for a location there since 2005. The city has turned them down, petitions have been signed, ordinances to make deliveries easier have failed, but the company soldiers on. Demographic analysis seems to make it a great place to sell cheap stuff. I don’t quite get it, but I believe retailers believe it.

At 2 PM on Friday the area was busy, probably as busy as any typical Saturday in winter. No lines outside Target or Ross, parking spaces typically scarce, lots of people enjoying lunch in the sunshine, but no big deal really. Police were at the ready, on foot and motorcycle, but there wasn’t a lot of action.

Next stop: Lincoln Road, Miami Beach. From Midtown, it’s an easy ride over the causeway, down Alton Road to tourist Mecca. I drove by the Macy’s that abuts Lincoln Road – total Ghost town. No people, no traffic, no visual evidence of any recent activity. But Lincoln Road itself was hopping. I saw a lot of people at the sidewalk cafes. Very few carried shopping bags of any sort.

Next Phase of the Journey: Biscayne Boulevard. It’s an easy ride across the Venetian Causeway, and takes us for a drive up the entire length of Biscayne Boulevard in Miami-Dade County (I ended my ride at the Broward County line). The first part of the drive isn’t heavily retail-focused. Sure I passed a Staples, OfficeMax, Ross Stores and a Home Depot, but there was nothing particularly busy, and I sped along in the sun. Once you head into North Miami, you enter strip mall heaven, and remain in that world until you pass into Broward County.

The only places I saw crowds of any substance at all were CompUSA/Tiger Direct, the strip center with Old Navy and Bed, Bath and Beyond (reports are that Old Navy was busy on Friday in many parts of the country – I believe it opened at midnight), and Nordstrom Rack (which did not open on Thursday). I passed the SuperTarget in North Miami Beach and while the parking lot had a lot of cars in it, there were no lines. This SuperTarget is the place where protein bars were cheerfully given out by store employees last year for those waiting for store opening Thanksgiving night. I assume lines were long this year as well.

I was obligated to drive by the entrance to Aventura Mall. Traffic was completely insane, but there are a couple of things worthy of note: 1) the good people of Aventura would turn out for a can opening. That’s just what there is to do in Aventura, a city of high-rise buildings for North and South American snowbirds. People go to the mall. I went to the movies at the mall in August, when no one in their right mind is in Miami. The place was packed. Go figure. But what I also need to point out here is 2) the Aventura Mall did not open until 6 am Friday. So the crowd was a more “natural ” crowd than the artificially-deflated strip mall traffic.

Final Stop: Once past the mall, I ended my journey at the strip center shared by Best Buy, Whole Foods, PetSmart and [another] Target. There was some hub-bub at Best Buy, but by circling round to the Target side of the mall, I avoided a long wait, found an easy parking space, and had lunch at Whole Foods. Most fascinating to me, I inadvertently dropped a bottle of jam while standing at the check-out stand. Within seconds two employees were out with brooms dust pans and cleaning rags. In the blink of an eye it was like it had never happened. That might well have been the most impressive part of my journey.

Retailers, I’d really love your feedback on this. Was it worth it? The NRF says it’s now a fixture in the US. Why? If comps end up the same 4.5% that everyone’s been predicting, did you accomplish anything? Let me know. You know where to find me!