The world knows Black Friday as a day exclusively meant for shopping to lap up astonishing shopping deals retailers offer to attract customers. The occasion, now popular in many countries, is a typical American event that falls on the day after Thanksgiving Day and is traditionally a holiday for many employees. The day of big discounts and special shopping deals is what retailers wait for and prepare throughout the year to boost their sales immensely. The Walmart Black Friday sale is when the retailer offers rock-bottom prices to eliminate excess inventory. It is also an opportunity to provide incredible discounts and deals on seasonal items such as holiday gifts and decorations. The Black Friday sale acts like a curtain raiser for the upcoming Christmas and New Year festivities. And it is a great day for bargain hunters to maximize their gains during the pre-holiday sales.
Walmart Black Friday Sale: A Pointer to the Country’s Economy
Besides Walmart and other giant retailers like Amazon, Costco, and Kroger, almost all sizes of retailers look forward to Black Friday to achieve a healthy bottom line for their businesses. The biggest sales day in the United States, held on the last Thursday of November, acquires a lot of significance for shoppers as they can buy various items at almost throw-away prices. Walmart’s Black Friday deals offer deep discounts on everything from toys to electronics while signaling the onset of shopping for the Christmas season. Other retailers also provide generous discounts with an eye on generating record sales. It helps to erase the impact of low sales during the lean seasons.
However, the day has special significance for economists and the country’s policymakers. They consider the day’s sales figures as an indicator of the country’s economic condition. Economists use the discretionary spending figures to determine the average American’s confidence. Lower Black Friday translates into a sluggish economy for those who believe spending drives economic activity.
Online and In-Store Shopping Deals
Traditionally, Black Friday sales meant shoppers flocking to the retail stores to spend almost recklessly and avail of the discounts and deals that seem to be one of their kind. The shopping frenzy witnessed on that day is not comparable to any other occasion when retailers offer special deals. However, the growing popularity of online shopping compelled retailers to reach out to online shoppers with identical deals. The pre-pandemic Black Friday online sales peaked in 2018 and touched $6.2 billion, an astonishing increase of 23.6% over the previous year’s figures.
Tremendous Increase in Revenue
Retailers are banking heavily on Black Friday Sales, targeting the highest revenue collection on that day while breaking previous records. As Walmart Black Friday deals are for online buyers too, the revenue increase is far higher than what it used to be during only in-store shopping days. The traffic of online customers goes up by almost 220% on Black Friday, which is even higher than the 155% attained on Cyber Monday. The Black Friday Sales pushed up revenue from online sales in the range of 240% to 380%, which is phenomenal.
That retailers are paying particular attention to attracting online shoppers is evident from how Walmart advertises this year’s deals on its website. On a closer look at the Walmart website, you will observe that the online shoppers have a wider shopping window as the sales go live on November 22 at 3 pm ET instead of the one-day sale for in-store customers on November 24 that starts from 6 am local time. Taking advantage of the round-the-clock online sales, Walmart is creating a FOMO (fear of missing out) among shoppers by declaring that the items covered by special deals are available in limited quantities. Moreover, they emphasize that some items may not be available in the stores.
The shopping window is the widest for Walmart+ members, considered privileged shoppers. They can access the Walmart Black Friday deals from noon ET, three hours ahead of non-member online buyers.
Besides gaining early access to the fabulous deals of Walmart black Friday, which gives a huge advantage to online buyers to lay their hands on the best deals before items go out of stock, they have the option of previewing more deals from 11.20 pm, forty minutes before the online sales start.
