We wish you Happy Thanksgiving. Now, we ask you a question. Is Black Friday shopping next?
And remember to look at our holiday shopping tips.
Black Friday Shopping Next?
Despite many shoppers avoiding Black Friday, millions are getting revved up. And they spend billions of dollars over Thanksgiving weekend. What about YOU?
Statista has two excellent infographics on Black Friday shopping. One covers the hours people shop. The other looks at impulsive shopping.
“A Statista survey on purchasing habits during the holiday season revealed that those participating in the Black Friday madness plan to make use of the many doorbuster deals, traditionally – is it a tradition already? – offered only during the early hours of the day. Being an early bird literally pays off, so that’s the logic of many holiday shoppers. Accordingly, pre-Black Friday advertising does too. So, if you don’t belong to the 47 percent planning to stay at home and you are looking for a new smartphone, some new swanky clothes or expensive toys for your kids, prepare to get up early; otherwise the Black Friday deals might be gone before you can make it to the stores.”
“Eager deal hunters will be going out with specific purchases in their crosshairs. Once in the stores, however, there is always the chance of stumbling across a great bargain which proves just too good to resist. The results of the Statista Thanksgiving & Holiday Survey 2016 showed that the product types most likely to spontaneously jump off the shelves and into U.S. shoppers’ carts are clothing, consumer electronics, and games/toys. 43 percent of respondents said that they would make an impulse purchase of ‘clothing, textiles, or shoes if they saw a good offer on Black Friday.”
One important thought to consider when anticipating Black Friday and its deals is the energy spent shopping versus the energy spent at an equivalent day of work. What shoppers save at the register, is typically subsidized in other ways, such as waiting in long lines, scanning advertisements for coupons, and standing in the cold November weather. In addition, the fierce competition makes it challenging to score the best deals at multiple stores, so motivated shoppers must also be ready to plan their route or accept being locked into shopping at a single store.
A person who makes $50 per hour and waits for 4 hours in order to spend $100 on a product that would normally sell for $200 could have gone to work for the same amount of time and made $200. They would have broken even.
A person who makes $5 per hour and waits for 4 hours in order to spend $100 on a product that would normally sell for $200 could have gone to work for the same amount of time and made $20. In order to afford the product at the original price, they would have to work an additional 16 hours. In their situation, waiting in line makes sense.
As the saying goes, time is money. Black Friday shoppers should be aware of this trade-off as they go out and shop.
good observation
Black Friday can be an amazing time and a horrible time. The deals are numerous and ubiquitous. I won’t be participating this year, due to a lack of funds haha. It seems that the best times to go would be that 5am-12pm block. The internet has taken a bigger part as the years go on for black friday. You no longer have to deal with all the crazy people in person, just pop ups that tell you the supply is no longer available.
I honestly don’t think Black Friday shopping is worth it. Saving a few dollars is not worth the time and effort in my opinion. The crowded stores and long lines are a no from me.
I think online shopping is more ideal and even if I was an early bird, I wouldn’t go Black Friday shopping at 4 or 5 am.
However, it is interesting to see that the most popular times people go Black Friday shopping is 5-8am. And most likely, the 4% of people who go shop at 4-5pm will be left with nothing.
Although there is a lot of hype surrounding Black Friday deals, I personally don’t think the sales are that great. Last year I remember buying a lot of holiday presents online during Black Friday, and about two weeks later found the same items sold at better prices. After having that happen to me, I decided that I rather purchase items when I have the time, instead of scrambling to buy everything at once. Most stores have better sales in December and it is always easy to find coupon codes online from popular Youtubers, especially since most have sponsored videos.
This is a really interesting topic, and also, I am really interested in. Thanksgiving is a holiday that people here in America spending time with their family, right after that, it is really a good time to spend some money together.
To buyers, shopping in Thanksgiving is also a gift for themselves. The feeling of shopping happily is a part of Holiday atmosphere. To many people, it’s not about to calculate the opportunity cost of time or the salary they earned, it’s a ceremony. From the graph, we can see people shop most on clothing, textiles and shoes. Those are normal goods.
The winter holiday season is coming, and Black Friday can be the best time to purchase gifts for friends or family members. There are lots of great deals, but Black Friday is just the beginning of the seasonal sales. I don’t understand why people wait for several hours in cold winter night. We can make an online purchase.
I feel that Black Friday shopping is overrated. The opportunity cast of waiting on ridiculously long lines are insane. The best part is how majority of these ‘great deals’ last all weekend, not just on that Friday. Also, a lot of these ‘great deals’ are similar to Christmas deals and after Christmas deals. Online shopping is really the best way to approach this tradition.
Every year black Friday shopping starts early and early taking away from the holiday Thanksgiving. Instead of having dinner and than spending quality time with your family people are spending time in stores running all over the place trying to find the best deals. When stores open earlier for Black Friday shopping people come hours earlier waiting in front of the store so the can be the first ones in the store. I don’t go black Friday shopping, at least not in store, in anything ill do it online. Much easier and faster without all the craziness.
I see people starting to shop at stores right after they’ve had their Thanksgiving dinner. Also I know so many people who wait in lines ad midnight to go shopping. I definitely have recognized that a lot of my friends and family have switched to cyber Monday because the deals are sometimes better, but also for convenience. I personally am a fan of post-Christmas shopping, because a lot of things go on clearance and you also don’t have to deal with the crazy shoppers.
Over the last few years having worked retail, it is the worst to work on Black Friday. Most employers will abuse their worker’s availability just to have some additional sales, and people could work up to 30 hours in the 48 hour period from Thursday and Friday. I think the benefits fair outweigh the consequences for the profiting companies, but I do not think that it is beneficial to the labor force necessarily.
After working Black Friday this year, I have no doubts in wondering why clothing, textiles, and such are labeled at 43% of impulse buys. When I tell you that our store was busy non-stop because customers just kept coming in to buy clothes, regardless of sale or not, just because it was an impulse, I mean it. It’s amazing how much money people will spend on impulse.
It’s an amazing statistic that almost half of the American population surveyed won’t even shop on Black Friday, me included. I would like to see the same survey and premises given within this survey not for Black Friday, but also for Cyber Monday. Since online shopping has immensely increased within recent years, I wonder how many people shop or don’t shop on Cyber Monday. Do most of the sales made during Cyber Monday on clothing and textiles like Black Friday, or does technology sales surpass that? Are all the impulse buys order different than Black Friday’s?
Is Cyber Monday a big deal anymore since people have been shopping online for weeks (including this one)? Let’s see what the results show. 🙂
Growing up, I always thought it was a bizarre concept to spend your Thanksgiving night waiting in the freezing cold for hours for stores to open and I still do. Yes sales matter and money can be tight around this time of year but I guess I personally dont approve of black friday but that could just be the family side of me coming out. I’d rather just shop online, no wait, no hastle and no people.
great point, Laura!
I think Black Friday used to be more of a big deal than it is currently. There used to be a lot more sales that were strictly held on Black Friday only. Now, there are still sales on Black Friday, but these same sales continue for days at a time and can even be found throughout the year. I don’t think Black Friday is worth it anymore, especially with sales not being that special and the fact that you can get all the same products online.
Looking at the chart about what times people tend to shop on Black Friday, I wonder if only people who when to physical stores were surveyed. I did shop on Black Friday, but I shopped in bed, around 11pm, on Amazon. I’ve also noticed that retailers with an online presence, such as Victoria’s Secret, Forever21, ColourPop, and Rue21, are marketing “Black Friday Weekend” sales: sales that run from Thanksgiving to the end of Cyber Monday, or rotating “flash sales” that last a few hours each for the whole weekend. The former sale makes shopping more convenient for consumers because they can shop when the want, but the latter sale is actually very smart–because consumers may place many orders with one store over the course of the weekend as the sales change.
Black Friday is so famous around the world as a shopping day. So many people around the world would buy things in this day, no matter in U.S. or other countries. But according to my observation and experience, Black Friday is just a start of discount shopping season. Lots of brands would have sales during these two months. Don’t need to worry about if you miss some discount in BF. Maybe few days later you will get a better discount.
Personally, I don’t see why Black Friday is worthwhile. Today, there are so many great deals on the Internet where you don’t have to wait on line or leave your home. I believe the holiday weekend should be spent with family and friends instead of waiting on line at a store. Also, while in stores during Black Friday, you end up spending more than anticipated with impulse purchases.
Black Friday has been a big traditional way to celebrate Thanksgiving. People really can get some great deals. Many crazy shoppers would get pumped on Thanksgiving Thursday midnight. They love the Black Friday shopping vibe. However, I can’t enjoy this tradition because you need to get up really early and shop in the crowds waiting for a long time. I would rather stay in my cozy coach with hot coco and shop on my laptop.
This post is a bit surprising for me because I did not realize the large portion of people who do not go out shopping on Black Friday. The 47% seems like a large percentage of consumers to miss out on this day of deals, being almost half the consumer population. However, I can relate because this Black Friday was the first one in years that my family stayed home the day after Thanksgiving. With my family, we believe there are just not as many great deals on Black Friday anymore, making staying out all night looking for sales just not worth it anymore. The percentage of consumers who impulse buy is not surprising though. I feel as though any time I go out shopping I will be apt to unexpectedly buy a product if it is a good deal. Thus, the amount of people who impulsively buy clothes and other items is understandable and expected.
Good points
Nowadays, Black Friday is no longer limited to Friday and to the stores themselves. I did not partake in Black Friday shopping, however, I did go to the mall on Sunday for unrelated reasons, and ended up seeing that many stores were continuing their sales for the entire weekend, and I saw even more sales online. For the most part, every store I looked at had continuous sales for the entire weekend, into Monday and some even continuing into today. Therefore, I think its relatively pointless to go into stores on Black Friday, waking up early and dealing with the insane crowds when you can get the same deals for the entire weekend and even online and avoid going into the stores at all. While I do enjoy Black Friday because who doesn’t love a discount? I think that it’s dissipating from one day a year with insane sales to a full weekend of deals similar to those that you could find during any given holiday.
While my mom,sister, aunt and cousins love to wake up the morning after thanksgiving to go Black Friday shopping, I am never able to muster up enough motivation to go. In my opinion, it is not worth the effort/hassle to visit a jam-packed store with minimal (at best) parking available, just to save some money on a product. I do enjoy purchasing goods that are on sale; however, I prefer to wait until these items go on sale throughout the holiday season (as they most likely will) rather than experiencing the turmoil that is Black Friday.
I wonder how much of the Black Friday hype is due to the good deals or the perception of good deals. There are many cases in which a store may sell an item for $100 throughout the year but during Black Friday put down a price tag of $200 and mark it down by 50%. Is it the idea that you’re saving money the part that causes impulse shopping or is it the price itself?
Black Friday is an amazing time for consumers. But in my opinion, I will never participating for this time. Although the products will have the lowest price on this time, there are too many people shopping on this day, it will make me feel too tired, and some people may buy some things which they are not really need.
My friends and family all participate in Black Friday shopping, but I do not understand it. Typically, stores will tend to mark up items just before Clack Friday to give the illusion of price reductions on the actual day. I’m a typical last minute shopper and do most of my Christmas shopping 2 to 3 days before the holiday. I’ve found that when I go shopping the prices of most items tend to be cheaper than they were on Black Friday. I can only imagine this is because most retailers are trying to get rid of the overstock in inventory that they had already expected to sell so close to Christmas.