Inside Outdoor Fall 2017

Black Friday fatigue. Accenture sur- veys show that 64 percent of consum- ers say they are turned off by the idea of dealing with crowds of shoppers fighting to get so-called doorbuster deals. And the findings suggest retail- ers are partly to blame for shoppers’ lack of enthusiasm because they have blanketed consumers with ever-earlier holiday promotions, last-minute deals and post-holiday bargains. Fully 44 percent of consumers said they are less motivated to shop on Black Fri- day because they can get as good a deal on other days. Only 35 percent of consumers who plan to shop during Thanksgiving week are enthused about shopping on Black Friday, down sharply from the 51 percent who said the same last year and the 59 percent in 2015, according to PwC surveys. Overall, about 40 per- cent of U.S. internet users surveyed by Market Track said they would brave store crowds this year on Black Friday. Online gets the juice, stores still get the sales. It would be foolish to underestimate the swing in holiday spending toward online and mobile commerce. Every year, more and more shoppers opt for the convenience of clicking from their couches, citing crowds and long lines as the reasons to avoid physical stores. Whereas in-store holiday sales grow annually at about 3 or 4 percent lately, online sales growth rates have been in the mid- to high teens, and even higher for the mobile commerce subset. Indeed, we’ve all seen the surveys and predictions. Accenture found that more than half of shoppers say they will hitting nearly $3.34 billion, show figures from Adobe Insight. It’s quite possible that Black Friday e-commerce sales in 2017 will overtake Cyber Monday’s, which grew at a slower 12.1 per- cent in 2016, to hit $3.45 billion. Back in-store, consumers increasingly report to start- ing their holiday shopping before Black Friday (lead- ing some experts to use the term “Black No- vember”), while many consumers are sim- ply suffering from US Internet Users Who Plan to Shop In-Store on Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Sept 2017 % of respondents Source: Market Track Reasons for electing in- ore over online: By household income % of respondents Source: Deloitte 54% 59% 62% 51% 50% 49% 44% 44% 45% Thanksgiving Black Friday Cyber Monday Ability to interact with the product Avoid shipping cost Gives me gift ideas and inspiration <$50K <$50K-$99K <$100K+ Hours employers plan to give vs. hours seasonal workers want Source: Snagajob 1-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41+ HOURS PER WEEK 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0% Employers Seasonal workers 30.1% 39.8% 26.8% FALL 2017 | Inside Outdoor 41