Retailers will be hoping this year’s Black Friday will boost flagging sales. The British Retail Consortium (BRC) reported that non-food sales, in the year to October, rose by just 0.2 percent, the lowest since it started assessing the category in January 2011 (BBC).
BRC chief executive Helen Dickinson noted that “consumers appear to have opted for outdoor experiences and excursions during half term, over visits to the shops”. Additionally, she noted that clothing retailers had been most hard hit due to unseasonably warm weather. However, other retailers will also be affected as the BRC stated shoppers were “ever more cautious in considering what purchases they can afford”.
Deals “not all they seem”
To compound this, consumer group Which? warned potential Black Friday shoppers that deals are “not all they seem”. It reported that 60 percent of the items it tracked were cheaper or the same price on other days of the year. It advised shoppers to look at the price and not the saving (BBC).
Spending is still expected to rise
In spite of this, analysts at GlobalData expect sales during the Black Friday period, between Monday 20 November and Monday 27, to reach £10.1 billion this year (GlobalData).
Eleanor Parr, retail analyst at GlobalData, said this was due in part to increased retailer participation, but also higher prices. She highlighted this inflation will slow the year-on-year sales growth of the electrical category as these higher prices will discourage spend.
She also claimed inflation would mean retailers would not be able to offer the levels of discounts seen in 2016 and that “retailers will need to be creative with how they advertise Black Friday promotions this year, for example promoting multi-buy offers or free gifts with purchases if they cannot afford to offer large discounts.”
Brand View Black Friday analysis
Brand View will publish an Insight on Black Friday with an analysis of the pricing and promotion of the headline deals offered by retailers, with a comparison to previous years. We will follow this a few days later with a further Insight conducting a deeper dive into the Black Friday deals offered by Amazon.