Black Friday is only weeks back and Christmas just around the corner. Most of us are still playing around with the gadgets that we got from the bargain hunting. At the same time, we are getting ready for the biggest shopping spree of the year. But let’s stop for a second and have a look at some numbers from the Black Friday week of 2018.
More than 40 million people shopped exclusively online between 22nd and 26th of November 2018 (Thanksgiving weekend and Cyber Monday), as reported by the US National Retail Federation. This trend crossed the Atlantic and was well adopted by fellow UK bargain hunters making it the biggest year sale.
US sales figures for these notable days:
- Cyber Monday: $7.9 billion, up 19.3%
- Black Friday: $6.22 billion, up 23.6%
- Thanksgiving Day: $3.7 billion, up 28%
So, are there any deals left?
Undoubtedly, the king category of any Black Friday and especially Cyber Monday, is consumer electronics. TVs, laptops and phones have become over the years the most bought and wished for items. But, people do not need use or need phones and TVs only during Thanksgiving or Christmas and your kind of always feel this let down when you have to buy them full price, especially if you just missed a good deal. That is why you should always use websites like Camel Camel Camel to check price lows and highs and then head to any specialised websites to compare mobile phones or TVs and laptops.
How is Black Friday affecting prices the whole year?
PWC has put together this consumer insights on Black Friday including the days before and after. They are suggesting, based on data, that they could help consumers to make timely decisions when it comes to deal hunting.
“Historically retailer promotions increased steadily from mid-November onwards. But, in the past two years, we’ve seen retailers launch special promotions for the Black Friday period, before returning to full price and thus preserving margin in the key Christmas present buying period of early-to-mid December … “
Going back to the UK it was made clear that this is something well settled in consumers’ way of thinking as John Lewis only reported an almost 8% of an increase in sales, compared to sales of last year. Though this increase was well translated to a big decrease right after the Black Friday week, showing that is easy to lure customers in but it is very difficult to change the market’s capacity.
What is next?
Establishing the fact that Black Friday has successfully migrated to Europe, especially in the UK, someone only wonders what is next? The answer might be very straight forward as Europe and US are still both ignoring the trends set by the world’s biggest ecommerce platform (Nope, not Amazon) Alibaba and its own singles day. Singles day is a Chinese deals day very similar to Black Friday that is held every 11th of November. This year this day produced the highest ever sales figure. The key is that singles day focuses more on luxury items. This is most probably why the same amount that was sold during the entire 24 hours of Black Friday on Amazon, was sold in 5 minutes on Alibaba! Our guess it is that it is just a matter of time before we start “celebrating” the singles day in Europe and USA.
