The turkey hasn't even hit the table yet, but analysts are already handicapping the 2007 holiday shopping season.

Ayuna Kidder, an economist and consultant for TNS, predicts that sales growth will be the slowest in five years, at a 3.3 percent rate compared with 4.6 percent last year; the National Retail Federation, however, is projecting a more optimistic 4 percent rate of growth. Forecasts vary, but virtually all are in agreement that skyrocketing energy costs and the weakness in the housing market will take their toll on holiday spending.

The potential for a smaller piece of the pie has made retailers only gun harder to grab customers early. So Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, is again shaping up to be an all-out battle.  

Black Friday may not be the busiest shopping day of the season (that honor actually goes to the Saturday before Christmas), but investors look to the day's receipts for a preview of what they can expect from retail sales for the holiday period.

The shopping day is dominated by big-box retailers—some of the hardest hit by the downturn in consumer spending—and they're eager to send a positive message to Wall Street about their sales prospects.

This season, more than half of the consumers polled by online market-research firm Compete said that their first stop on Black Friday would be Wal-Mart or Best Buy, which have been leaders in slashing prices and extending store hours in recent years.

Every year the discounts get deeper and the shop doors open earlier. Some stores are opening at midnight on Thursday and offering "door-buster" sale items at or below cost, so competing retailers will have to start looking for other inventive ways to win the coveted first stop of the day.  

Best Buy offers the best prices in limited quantities as a means of enticing consumers to be the first to hit the checkout lines after doors open at 5 a.m. Chuck O'Donnell, a district services manager for Best Buy, says that shoppers start lining up as early as 5 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. Some stores even hire D.J.'s to entertain crowds, which can number in the thousands.

Best Buy also prints color-coded maps pointing out the locations of their hottest items, and employs legions of sales reps to help the potentially chaotic situation run smoothly.

Flat-out price cuts aren't the only way retailers are trying to draw crowds: Sam's Club, a chain of discount clubs owned by Wal-Mart Stores, will serve breakfast from 5:30 to 9:30 on Friday morning to early-bird shoppers.

In addition, retailers have been using interactive marketing to build suspense and establish a rapport with customers. WalMart.com encourages users to sign up for text messages that will divulge "Secret In-Store Specials" directly to them as soon as they are announced.

And with an increasing portion of holiday sales moving online—38 percent this year, according to the research group Conference Board—internet retailers are getting involved too. Amazon.com is offering a Black Friday Sweepstakes in an effort to make sure they're not sidelined by all the offline hype.

Here are the monthly retail sales data in year-over-year percentage changes: