People line up for Black Friday deals
I find it so odd that we have Black Friday even though we don’t have American Thanksgiving. People were lining up overnight in hopes of getting deals.
I can’t help seeing this as a way for retail to clear older stock out so they can put out more expensive stuff for Christmas shoppers. Am I mistaken?
Blork 12:26 on 2020-11-27 Permalink
The link between Black Friday and Thanksgiving is tenuous. I think it’s primarily because most USers are off work today so hey, might as well go shopping. Canadian retailers are just riding the wave of free publicity about it that drifts up from south of the border.
I am so not a Black Friday shopper, but then every Black Friday I suddenly realize “wait a sec; there are some things I want/need, so why not buy them now and save some bucks?” (Which is different from the frenzy of shopping for things you don’t want or need, just because you got caught up in it.) But then I can’t remember what it is I’m thinking about buying.
And yeah, I think it is a way of clearing out old stock. The company I buy underwear from sent me a Black Friday specials email, and I though “why not?” since I do wear underwear. Why not buy it now, cheaper, instead of waiting a few months and paying full price? But then none of the styles/colors I wanted were available in my size, so no deal. :-/
One other thing: loads of software and online services on sale today, so if you were thinking about trying premium versions of this or that, or that photo editing software you’ve been thinking about, etc., today’s your day.
Kate 13:14 on 2020-11-27 Permalink
Yes. I bought two of the Affinity apps, which I’ve wanted for awhile and which were on sale this week.
Incidentally, I used some of my Patreon cash for this, and thank everybody again.
Meezly 14:02 on 2020-11-27 Permalink
Exactly, Kate. Clearing out old stock to make way for shiny new stuff. Also so many chain and box stores are owned by American companies now. In an American capitalist’s mind, Canada is just one big annexed state of 37 million consumers.
Azrhey 21:01 on 2020-11-27 Permalink
By a quirk of the calendar canadian thanksgiving is different from USian one. But at least we HAVE a Thanksgiving. I find it so WEIRD to go to random online portuguese and Spanish shops and find Black Friday deals plastered all over in big swats of yellow and black with poorly animated turkeys at the edges. TURKEYS!
Paint me unimpressed! consumerism rant. capitalism rant. americaa imperialism rant.
dhomas 07:41 on 2020-11-28 Permalink
Black Friday became increasingly popular with Canadians around the late 2000’s. In 2007, the Canadian dollar was worth more than the US dollar. However, most goods here were still priced about 30% higher than in the US, mostly just because they always were due to the historical exchange rate. Canadians were buying tons of stuff in the US with their newly found purchasing power. And then they discovered Black Friday. These deals combined with the high Canadian dollar got tons of Canadians to go spend their cash South of the border. By the time Canadian Boxing Day sales came around, consumers had nothing left to spend or nothing left they wanted to buy for themselves. Canadian retailers were hurting. So, they decided to throw their own Black Friday sales to take back some of those retail dollars. And it mostly worked.
Black Friday does have some decent deals. But a lot of it is also a legal form of bait and switch. “This TV is 85% off (only 10 in stock per store)!”. After those first ones are sold, people who came in looking for a TV buy something else with a higher profit margin. Those deals might even be loss leaders to drive more sales. Boxing Day is more about clearing out of stock that didn’t sell very well in the period leading up to Christmas.
Kate 13:50 on 2020-11-28 Permalink
Good history, dhomas. Thank you.
david211 17:16 on 2020-11-28 Permalink
I had almost completely forgotten about boxing day sales, which were huge when I was young.