The Marketing Invention of Blue Monday

Blue Monday was not discovered by science but was created as a strategic marketing ploy. A travel agency invented the date in 2005 to convince people that booking summer vacations would cure their seasonal winter blues.

The formula used to calculate this saddest day of the year is widely considered pseudoscience by experts. It combines vague factors like weather and debt to justify a specific date in January. Despite having no basis in actual psychology, the idea became a global media sensation. It serves as a fascinating example of how a clever advertising campaign can be mistaken for a scientific fact.