Happy Thanksgiving! Today, Americans celebrate what they’re thankful for with bounteous turkey dinners shared with family and friends. Tomorrow is Black Friday, a day of special discounts and hardcore shopping. Let’s take a look at the best apps custom-designed to make the next few days flow a little smoother.

The 85th Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade starts at 9am in New York. Giant floating cartoon characters, elaborately decorated floats and the Radio City Rockettes will process down the 2.2 mile long route. 50 million Americans are expected to watch the parade on TV, and an astonishing 3.5 million New Yorkers will line the parade route. A touching display of enthusiasm – and a logistical nightmare. This year, Macy’s released the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade app for those spectators with smartphones. The app will feature the marching order, the parade’s history and an online store. Macys has also teamed up with MyCityWay to help spectators find the closest restaurants, WiFi spots and toilets. Live video streams from traffic cameras along the route will also be accessible, so overenthusiastic TV viewers can get every single perspective on the parade.

The Thanksgiving Coloring Book could prove a boon to harassed parents who just want to get on with the cooking. It does exactly what it says on the tin, displaying line drawings of pilgrims, Native Americans and turkeys for children to colour in using a variety of virtual crayons. Of course, colouring books are easily come by but kids need table space to colour, which may be in short supply during Thanksgiving. The resulting messless pictures are shareable across social media, perhaps with the family members who couldn’t make it to the Thanksgiving dinner.

Hardcore shoppers are downloading TGI Black Friday to get the most out of the day of discounts. The app allows shoppers to follow the development of deals from major retailers in real time and search for specific items in their area. They can also compare prices. With the exception of a few high-profile price reductions, Black Friday deals are tightly guarded corporate secrets until the day itself. Correspondingly, the Internet is always abuzz with fresh rumours and leaks which shoppers avidly follow in the days of waiting. To help keep users updated, TGI Black Friday has push notifications to let shoppers know when new deals are reported or confirmed. It’ll be interesting to see whether better informed consumers are more or less likely to stay rational in their pursuit of savings.

Earlier, we wrote about marketing strategy for Black Friday. We were surprised that major retailers promoted their brands more aggressively than their actual discounts. Apps like TGI Black Friday empower consumers to hunt down the best deals for themselves. Because it’s easier than ever to compare prices, big brands are better off promoting themselves as discount-type places than actually showing how much they’ll charge on Black Friday. Just another way technology is shaping our retailing experience.

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