Much ink has already been spilled on this pair of retail benchmarks, so I won’t drone on about it here. Suffice it to say that more people went shopping on the Friday after Thanksgiving that might have been expected—good news, of course—but the spending-per-person was a bit down (symptomatic of consumers who are still in a cautious mindset.) Down, too, was overall retail spending for this date, formerly known as the kick-off of holiday shopping. (I say that because many retailers were offering “Black Friday” prices long before Black Friday.)
The consolation prize for retailers—or at least, those with successful websites—is that online activity met or exceeded expectations on the following Monday (symptomatic of consumers that are more likely to do plenty of research before making a purchase decision).
For more details on either retail benchmark, click to see the stories offered by Media Post on both Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Implications:
While the recession is widely reported to be over, the effects of the recession are not. No surprises there. Lots of consumers have suffered some kind of economic trauma—or know someone who has—whether that trauma came in the form of a job loss, a drop in the equity of their home, declining investment portfolio, or just from being inundated with a slew of negative headlines over the past year.
People will purchase more cautiously for a while. As we have written in this space before (on numerous occasions), they are likely to be more deliberate, methodical, and careful.
This second-consecutive “down to earth” holiday season, success will find retailers who understand what shoppers are trying to accomplish… and help them achieve it.
Mike Anderson
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