Leave it to a brilliant business entrepreneur mother of six daughters to come up with an ingenious “manicure system” for busy nail polish-loving women everywhere!

The duality Nail Paks come with long-lasting, chip-resistant, salon-strength polish in a bottle that looks like most others but on the twist-off bottom of the packaging is a built-in compartment featuring a nail file and pre-soaked non-acetone nail polish remover pads.

All the colors are on trend and vibrant, and the shimmery holiday collection is a perfect last-minute stocking stuffer--yu will definitely want more than a few of these brilliantly designed beauty treats, so go now to the website.

If you can’t go a single morning without a cup of Starbucks brew, you are in for a treat.

According to USA Today, Starbucks will offer customers the opportunity to purchase new, limited edition, metal gift card loaded with $400.

The specially-etched Starbucks Metal Cards are made out of steel, not plastic, and cost $50 each to make, which explains the $450 price tag.

USA Today reports the card also comes with gold-level benefits such as gifts and free refills on brewed coffee and tea.

Starbucks will only make 5,000 of the metal cards.

These cards will not be available in stores, only on Gilt.com, starting Thursday, Dec. 8.

There is perhaps no more glaring exhibition of American consumerism than Black Friday: shoppers spending their long Thanksgiving weekends camped outside big-box stores for the chance to fight through crowds for the latest gadgets and toys.

Retailers invest a lot of hope in that day, because it can be used to build momentum for the six-week holiday shopping season, their most profitable time of year.

But Black Friday isn’t the economic bellwether that it used to be. The thrifty financial landscape, and the growth of online shopping, have arguably diminished the event’s impact, even as it grows in popularity, with more stores opening on Thanksgiving or offering sales weeks earlier.

“Everyone’s going to hype it, and there are a lot of deals out there, and some people make it an experience in itself, but I don’t think it’s as much of a leading indicator of the holiday season,” said Dennis Jacobe, chief economist for Gallup, the research and polling firm.

The biggest reason, Jacobe said, is that while the recession has abated, consumer caution has not. His studies show that that more Americans say they’re confident in the economy, but they aren’t as willing to exercise that faith by opening their wallets. That includes upper-income shoppers, who may be growing anxious about the looming fiscal cliff’s impact on their taxes. The lingering effects of Hurricane Sandy could be a factor as well.

Many researchers have reported modest spending in the weeks leading up to Black Friday.

In other words, the crowds that turn out for door-buster deals this weekend can’t necessarily be expected to remain enthusiastic.

From an economic researcher’s perspective, Black Friday is more sport than science. Analysts say that sales figures during this brief period are less a function of the broader fiscal climate than of the effort retailers go to in drawing people to their stores.

Because that effort grows every year, Black Friday—and the rest of the weekend—typically performs well, said Allen Sinai, chief economist and strategist at Decision Economics Inc. The zeal usually fades a bit, then picks up again in the days right before Christmas.

Sinai also recalled a couple occasions when a Black Friday turned out to be “a dud,” but sales rallied later in the holiday season.

That record, he said, was why he didn’t “place a lot of stock” in Black Friday as an accurate gauge of holiday-season shopping.

Tell an economist you're trying to get accurate data on Black Friday sales, and the response will often be “good luck.” Many organizations—retail trade groups, market researchers, polling firms—try it, but methods, and margins of error, vary. U.S. Commerce Department statisticians don’t break down economic data that narrowly.

Barry Ritholtz, director of equity research at Fusion IQ, takes to his popular blog every year to bemoan the “wildly optimistic” surveys that the media quotes at the end of Black Friday weekend.

Without fail, he says, the reports exaggerate consumer enthusiasm. He pointed to last year’s National Retail Foundation’s claim that sales had spiked by 16 percent – which, if true, would have been a record-breaking sum. There was no apparent attempt to check the data later on, but economists generally agree that consumer spending increased by less than 6 percent over the entire 2011 holiday season.

The NRF has predicted a slight decrease in the number of Black Friday shoppers this year.

“You should be reluctant to draw too big a conclusion from one day,” Ritholtz said. “As we’ve seen, it never lives up to the hype. In fact, part of the reason there’s so much hype and false signals is there are so many people trying to get a read into that one day, far more than what you should typically be willing to see in one day. This is an economy, not an event.”

His prediction, shared by many other researchers, is that no matter how frenetic Black Friday turns out to be, holiday season spending will enjoy a modest uptick this year. Bain & Co., for example, predicted a 3.5 percent increase in spending, compared to a 3.7 percent increase in 2011 and 3.8 percent the year before. Gallup has predicted a "good, though not great" performance.

The biggest variable, many say, is the fiscal cliff, the expiration of Bush-era tax cuts and automatic spending reductions that will go into effect Dec. 31 unless President Barack Obama can reach some kind of deal with Congress. If there is no solution before Christmas, consumers may get nervous, and hold back on holiday spending, some economists say.

Lawmakers are expected to get back to work on the issue after Thanksgiving weekend.

“Uncertainty is even greater than usual at this point,” said Scott Hoyt, senior director of consumer economics for Moody’s Analytics. “Whatever sales are like this weekend, it doesn’t really help to address that uncertainty."

Black Friday — it's the mother of all shopping days. A day when millions of people wielding billions of dollars scratch and claw for the biggest bargains. So what's the best plan of attack?

"My advice is to skip it entirely," says Jody Rohlena, senior editor at Shop Smart magazine.

Black Friday has been such a staggering marketing success that it's spawned Black Thursday, Cyber Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Small Business Saturday… the list goes on. The upside, as Rohlena sees it, is there's no need to focus all your energy, time and money on one day.

"We're gonna see really good markdowns all the way up to the Holidays, and guess what — when retailers have inventory that they're trying to unload, they're going to keep setting up new sales, so there can be advantages waiting," says Rohlena.

But whether you brave the crowds of Black Friday or not, you still need to be prepared. Even if you're a dedicated brick-and-mortar shopper, the Internet is your best starting point. There's a host of websites — BFAds.net, BlackFriday.com and SlickDeals.net — dedicated to tracking the best deals out there, as well as store hours.

"Take a look at those ads beforehand and really find out if they're great deals or not," advises Rohlena. "You can do quick searches at PriceGrabber.com, for example. Don’t assume because it's in a Black Friday circular that it's a great deal."

To help assuage your fears of overpaying, Rohlena says the big news this holiday season is in the realm of price matching. At a lot of stores, if you buy something and then find it cheaper someplace else, they'll refund you the difference.

If big box stores and national chains aren't your thing, Rohlena is a big fan of Small Business Saturday.

"People may think that prices are higher in those smaller independent retail stores — they may not necessarily be," he said. "And there's an advantage: If you ask for a better deal, you might be dealing directly with the owner, they have a lot more leeway to give you a better price. If you ask nicely, of course.

"If you go on AmericanExpress.com, you can register you card, if you use your AmEx to shop on Small Business Saturday at a participating retailer, they will give you a $25 credit. Spend $25, get the credit back on your bill — there's another really good reason to participate: free money."

If there's something you just have to have in-hand, Rohlena suggests a reconnaissance mission: going to the store a few days early to find out where your prey will be on display, the nearest entrance and the exact hour it will be available.

Among the other Internet tools available to the modern bargain hunter is the Black Friday Survival Guide app, which has a newsfeed, lets you search each store by category or each category by item, tells you exactly when each sale begins, provides competitor prices and lets you build a shopping list you can email to a loved one.

If the thought of the traffic and the crowds makes your chest tighten, the Internet is here to help but still requires a good plan. Rohlena recommends CyberMonday.com, CyberMonday2012.com, FreeShipping.org to see who's got free shipping and @cybermonday at Twitter.

With all of the new shopping tools at our disposal, why wade into the insanity of Black Friday at all?

"For those of us who really want to make sure we're giving a nice gift to someone we care about, I think it's important to be able to compare things physically, if you know what I mean, as opposed to virtually, online," says Dr. Tina Lowrey, professor of marketing at the University of Texas, San Antonio, and editor of "Brick & Mortar Shopping in the 21st Century."

"And for a lot of people, I think they enjoy being around other people that are in the holiday spirit, it's sort of an infectious kind of social gathering to be around… the communal nature of going out and being with other people who are out for the same reason."

Rohlena is unmoved.

"I know too much," he said. "I'm not going anywhere on Black Friday."

This February, quirky Italian retailer, Marni—which collaboated with H&M last spring–will debut its first-ever women's fragrance produced in collaboration with Estee Lauder. 

Like the Marni woman, the scent is designed to be fresh and individual. "The perfume reflects Marni's fashion, certainly," creative director Consuelo Castiglioni told WWD. "Becuase it's a perfume that's quite individual, that doesn't evoke anything in particular. It's for a woman who dresses for herself, who doesn't follow trends but is sophisticated and also maybe a little eccentric."

That may seem like a lot of sartorial inspiration for a scent, but the the concept registers in a spicy blend of wood notes, tempered with a touch of rose oil for a feminine feel.

The bottle itself is also meant to evoke the Marni brand, inspired by an old bottle Castiglioni salvaged from a flea market.

“I wanted a bottle that was kind of traditional, that is, one that lasts over time, like the clothes we make, which last and you can still wear two or three years from now," Castiglioni says. "It isn’t seasonal. I think this bottle reflects our concept—you want to keep it. It also has the dots, which are part of our world, and a play on proportions with the cap. These elements are also important in our fashion.”

It may be one of the oldest fashion brands in America, but Levi's is still changing with the times. This week, the denim brand unveils a collection of men's and women's dungarees fashioned from recycled plastic bottles and even plastic food trays.

Dubbed "Waste<Less," each piece in the new line contains 20 percent recycled content—or approximately eight 12 or 20 ounce plastic bottles per pair of jeans, WWD reports.

According to the company's global president, James Curleigh, the aim of Waste<Less is to add "value to waste," he told WWD. "This collection proves that you don’t have to sacrifice quality, comfort or style to give an end a new beginning.”

The unique fiber—wich required more than 3.5 million recycled bottles sourced from municipal recycling programs to manufacture—is fashioned into a polyster material before being spun into a cotton yarn. Because the brown and green hues from the bottles can't be removed, each piece has a subtly green-tinged color.

Dropping this January, the new collection will offer familiar favorites like the 511 skinny jean as well as a new 504 straight fit and trucker jacket. Women sick of painted-on skinny jeans will relish a slouchier fit "boyfriend skinny."

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and for a third year in a row American Eagle Outfitters’ Aerie has partnered with non-profit organization Bright Pink to promote further awareness about breast cancer, pro-active preventative measures, and raise funds for a great cause, critically important for every woman out there, especially younger women.

Running through October 21st, the Aerie Bright Pink partnership includes various components and will be promoted via Facebook, twitter, customer emails and in-store marketing. Buying bras has never felt this good or been more honorable!

For more information, please visit Aerie.com and Facebook.com/brightpink.