The Truth About Black Friday: How Early Discounts and Online Sales Shape, Not End, In-Store Shopping

Black Friday is in the rear-view mirror, and Super Saturday (Dec. 21^st this year) is still a few weeks away. As you conduct your post-mortem on Black Friday, you will probably read about how the day has lost its significance and how shoppers are starting the season more conservatively.

Don’t believe it!

We’ve been hearing about the impending “Death of Black Friday” for at least a decade, yet it remains the highest in-store traffic day of the year, with nearly double the foot traffic of its nearest challenger, Super Saturday. There are, however, trends worth exploring that can help retailers reset their strategies for the rest of the season and for next year as well. But to do so, we need to look beyond just traffic results.

Our friends from pass_by, an AI-powered geospatial insights company for retailers, report that visits to retail stores were down just 1.9% vs. Black Friday 2023. That’s the most optimistic view I’ve found, and it makes sense – pass_by isn’t just counting people who enter stores, they analyze holistic shopper behavior to all types of retail centers. Their data and insights are well worth the read and can be found here: Black Friday 2024 Report

Key Black Friday Data Highlights:

• Apparel: Down 6.5%
• Shoes: Down 3.7%
• Furniture: Down 2.5%
• Jewelry: Up +3.2%
• Grocery: Up +2.1%, despite the pressure of high grocery prices.

So, traffic was at worst slightly down in single digits (depending on sector and local circumstances) and up modestly at best. Not a bad turnout for bricks-and-mortar stores in comparison to other post-COVID years.

How Does Traffic Translate to Sales?

According to Mastercard, in-store sales grew by 0.7% while online increased by 14.6% for a total year-over-year retail increase of 3.4% for Black Friday. Modest growth but nothing to indicate that the day has lost any of its luster.

While brick-and-mortar growth was lighter than online, both positive trends indicate that shoppers were not as conservative as some would indicate. The fact that deep discounts were available throughout the week straight through to Cyber Monday would reflect that the positive sales increases were perhaps muted by those discounts. Shoppers are shopping this season and taking advantage of discounts.

Looking at the Adobe Experience Cloud, the bottom fell out of the discount trend starting on Monday, November 25^th, hovering around 20% off.

Broadening the Lens on Shopper Behavior

But the trends weren’t just about spreading shopper visits earlier in the week

To understand consumer behavior, it’s crucial to analyze the entire season by day, factoring in variables such as:

• Retail Sector
• Shopping Center Type
• Geographic/Economic Conditions
• Weather
• Discounting (further)
•  Calendar Alignments (e.g., Thanksgiving was a week earlier last year, providing more shopping days)

We put out our predictions for the Top 10 days for US Retail and for 10 different retail sectors here:

StrataVision’s Take on Top Shopping Dates

It’s not too late to align your labor and merchandising strategies for many of these key dates.

The Road Ahead

As you reflect on individual store performance, a good rule of thumb is that where traffic was down, it’s important to see where Sales per Shopper (multiply Conversion Rate by Average Transaction Size) landed. If traffic is down, stores need to make up for the possible sales gap with a higher Sales per Shopper year-over-year percentage. Coach your sales teams to use this as their barometer and to reinforce the associate behaviors that increase Conversion and Average Transaction Size, and you can maximize store sales results.

And as you look forward to the rest of the holiday season, look again at the discount line graphs from Adobe. Years of retail strategy have conditioned consumers to anticipate deeper discounts closer to the season’s end. While this may drive late-season foot traffic, it will undoubtedly pressure profit margins.

Ultimately, today’s informed shoppers know what they want and strategically decide when—and where—to buy. Retailers who align their strategies with these behaviors can position themselves for a strong finish to the season.

If you’re looking to customize your approach to the shopper journey or gain a deeper understanding of your competitive landscape, we’re here to help. Reach out to us for tailored insights and strategies.

Brian is VP of Analytics at StrataVision, focusing on helping clients maximize their ROI by transforming desired outcomes into actionable use cases, leveraging data to provide insights into shopper and associate behavior.