Shop Talk
Retailers, consumers and prices
Sorting through Black Friday data
Black Friday has come and gone but what on earth happened at the cash registers over the Thanksgiving weekend? The data is trickling in, and so are the early critiques. (See our previous blogs: Treat Black Friday reports cautiously and Black Friday data spurs more questions than answers)
Here is a break down of the latest reports and what data is still to come:
According its 2008 Black Friday Weekend survey, conducted by BIGresearch and published on Sunday, the NRF said more than 172 million shoppers visited stores and websites over Black Friday weekend (which includes Thursday, Friday, Saturday and projections for Sunday), up from 147 million shoppers last year.
Shoppers spent an average of $372.57 this weekend, up 7.2 percent over last year’s $347.55. Total spending reached an estimated $41.0 billion, up from $34.6 billion a year ago.
The results came from a survey that polled 3,370 consumers from Nov. 27-29. The consumer poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 1.7 percent.
ShopperTrak:
-
Resident Shop Talk Expert
-
There’s still a lot of people working, a lot of people with cash, a lot of people with credit. Those people are always prepared to buy – if the price is right. Thanks to sites like http://www.blackfridayads2009.info which utilizes both ads scans and relevant links and hot deals available now, there will be plenty of action and sales on Black Friday. The only people who need to slow down their spending are the elected people in Washington DC