Black friday has typically been the biggest shopping day of the year, and a day that both the retailers and consumers look forward to every other 364 days of the year. This year had a devastating decline of 11% of retail sales compared to the prior Black Friday. This is the second consecutive drop in sales in the past two years. This decrease is a strong indicator that the whole idea of Black Friday is becoming more and more irrelevant for the American consumers. It is not because consumers do not like to spend money, but it is the fact that sales start a few days, maybe weeks, before the traditional Black Friday following Thanksgiving. The extended days of offering deals allows the consumers ample opportunities to purchase discounted goods, as opposed to the chaotic rush of solely one. For example, Target initiated their “Black Friday” deals on November 10th, that’s 18 days before the actually Black Friday. Even Amazon’s sales declined. They offered a four day “Black Friday” weekend sale and it declined $134 million, 5.2% from the year prior. Overall holiday sales are expected to increase 4.1%, but it is not due to the holiday excitement of Black Friday. Black Friday sales is also on a heavy incline from personal shopping to online shopping to avoid the chaos and competition for the last flat screen television, or other hot holiday items. However, even this year online sales dropped by 2% from 2013. So the real question is that if people are intimidated in spending money during the highest commercial purchases of the year because they do not believe in the economy, or is it that Black Friday has lost all its hype and people prefer to do their shopping at home. I believe it is the consumers being nervous and unwilling to spend excess money on elastic good when they could spend it on necessities instead.
Source: http://online.wsj.com/articles/holiday-weekend-retail-sales-sink-11-1417376714?tesla=y&ref=/home-page
On an interview the manga of a Walk mart said that initially thr sales made at black Friday were profitable and now its more of a tradition. I feel that maybe the population growth rate please a factor in this
ReplyDeleteThat interesting that sales declined again this year. Especially when gas prices are extremely low right now. People might be fed up with how crazy black Friday has gotten. I don't think this has to do with people be uncertain about the economy. Hopefully people are spending their money more wisely or saving more. That might be why sales has declined so much over the years.
ReplyDeleteI believe the decline in sales is due to the number of days that the sales last and also a still not fully recovered consumer confidence. I think the meaning of "Black Friday" sales has been lost considering some last for weeks on end which puts less pressure on the consumer to spend and decreases demand (sales).
ReplyDeleteI'm curious as to whether or not the protests involving Ferguson had any impact on the decline in Black Friday sales. Many of the protests encouraged shoppers to not make purchases on Black Friday. It'd be interesting to see if this had an effect.
ReplyDeleteThe decline in Black Friday sales I feel is a combination of multiple aspects which were covered in this article. The chaotic nature of the Black Friday sales, the couple days even weeks of sales companies offer for Black Friday I feel both play a major part in the reason for the drops in sales. The ability for one to shop at home I feel also plays a major role in the amount of people lining up a stores to purchase goods. I don't believe the population is uncertain in the economy, I just feel the hype for Black Friday is diminishing because these objects go on sale all the time, so what's the rush to buy them on that particular day.
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