Black Friday attracts U.S. shoppers, but many reject online stores by Reuters

By Richa Naidu and Arriana McLymore

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Commercial hunters dared to buy Christmas presents in cold weather on Black Friday to learn that many U.S. retailers were offering lower price reductions this year, including tight supplies.

Fears of COVID and fewer “door-to-door” sales reduced the crowd the day after the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday, which marks the start of the year-end holiday shopping season.

On the same day, the World Health Organization designated the newly identified omicron variant of coronavirus as a “worrying variant,” sold around the world and sold on the U.S. stock market.

Black Friday stores had the lowest level of merchandise on sale in five years or more, Cowen analysts said in a statement. Many shoppers chose to pick up merchandise instead of going into stores.

Black Friday retail sales are up 29.8% from 2020 at 3:00 p.m., according to Mastercard (NYSE 🙂 SpendingPulse.

Consumers spent $ 6.6 trillion on Friday until 9 p.m., according to the Adobe (NASDAQ 🙂 Digital Economy Index, which expected spending of between $ 8.8 trillion and $ 9.2 billion a day.

Walmart (NYSE 🙂 and Goal (NYSE 🙂 It outperformed other retailers in part because of online store shopping and collection services, Cowen said. Target added more than 18,000 parking spaces, more than double the number of places last year. The company said its most popular Black Friday offerings included a $ 219.99 sale for $ 429.99 for a professional KitchenAid mixer and savings of up to $ 60 on Apple (NASDAQ 🙂 Watches and AirPods.

Several markets – including Walmart, Target and Best Buy – are expected to see lower profit margins in the fourth quarter due to narrow inventory and higher raw material, cargo and labor costs. “Even if the holiday season is going to be good from a sales point of view – because retailers are getting fewer discounts – margins won’t necessarily be higher as a result of inflation,” he said. Forrester Research (NASDAQ 🙂 Sucharita Kodali analyst.

U.S. consumers are entering the holiday season full of cash, thanks to several rounds of government pandemic mitigation, still a huge pile of savings, and double-digit wage increases as companies compete with employees. However, retailers were attracted to buyers in September this year for holiday shopping because the supply chain is blocked https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/containergeddon-supply-crisis-drives-walmart-rivals-hire -their- own-ships-2021-10-07 prevented the rapid renewal of end-of-year goods.

A Deloitte survey showed that people spent 80% to 85% of their holiday gift budgets even before Black Friday. For November and December, online sales are projected to record a record $ 207 billion, 10% more than last year, according to the Adobe Digital Economy Index. The National Retail Federation estimates that combined brick-and-mortar holiday sales will be between $ 843.4 billion and $ 859 billion, up 8.5% and 10.5% from last year.

Elver Gomez, a 21-year-old Chicago student, said he did not want to find Apple and Microsoft (NASDAQ 🙂 laptops while shopping at a Best Buy store on Friday morning. “It looks like the stock is sold out this year,” or he said it was for sale, “not that high price.” Best Buy added a message on its website to warn of “limited quality” and “no rainfall”.

Electronics — which is inadequate due to a shortage of chips — had the highest level of depleted stocks, followed by personal care, and by home and garden, according to Adobe. In November as a whole, stock shortages increased by 261% compared to 2019.