Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz, of the Chicago Tribune, contributed to this report.
After growing for several years, the all-important Black Friday shopping weekend took a double-digit tumble, recent figures from the National Retail Federation show.
With retailers offering steep discounts early and often, shoppers have lost the sense of urgency to gorge on sales during Black Friday weekend, helping drive spending down during the weekend by an estimated 11 percent, the trade group said.
Fresno State marketing professor William Rice said that fewer people see the value of these shopping days.
“All kinds of Black Friday deals, like Monday computer deals and weeklong programs, have diluted the single day perspective,” he said.
But that doesn’t mean this year’s holiday season, which typically accounts for one-fifth of the industry’s annual revenues, is doomed.
“Last year, many companies did great bargains a few days before Christmas. So people are waiting to see if they can get similar deals just before Christmas Day,” Rice said. “The economy is down, and the middle class, which buys the most stuff, is more cautious this year.”
A second perspective is that people had already started looking for deals prior to Black Friday.
“With ‘Christmas Creep,’ the idea that marketers are appealing for holiday spending earlier and earlier in the year, many consumers likely had begun holiday shopping, and it wasn’t worth the effort, time and hassle to participate in Black Friday,” said Fresno State marketing professor Monique Bell.
However, the season is long and doesn’t end until well into January, said Scott Tuhy, a vice president at Moody’s Investors Service.
“I think the consumer is getting smarter, and they realize that retailers are likely to continue a promotional cadence from now until past Christmas,” Tuhy said.
“It’s still early enough that I don’t think retailers need to panic just yet,” Tuhy said. “The next few weeks will be important,” he said.
On the other hand, consumers seemed to like Cyber Monday a bit more. Instead of having to drive to different stores, Cyber Monday offers great deals for online shoppers at their convenience over the Internet.
Sales had grown by 8.5 percent for that whole day. IBM Digital Analytics said Cyber Monday was confirmed to be the biggest online shopping day of the year.
Consumers spent about $2.65 billion, a 16 percent increase from last year, according to Adobe tracking data.
Another recent initiative building momentum is Small Business Saturday, which supports local businesses. Despite minimal awareness, as the idea was only created by American Express in 2010, the day saw a slight increase in sales over normal.