High St’s Bleak Friday: Shops are empty as record numbers hunt bargains online
CROWDS queuing up for stores to open, a scrum of shoppers scouring the shelves and fights over cut-price goods are usually common sights on Black Friday.
But not this year – for many shoppers instead went online to hunt for bargains in the mass sales event.
The High Street was eerily deserted yesterday, with many shops quiet when doors opened. Meanwhile some websites including Boots, Game, Tesco and John Lewis struggled to cope with demand.
Barclaycard, which processes almost half of all card payments, handled 998 transactions a second from 1pm to 2pm – an all-time record and up from last year’s peak of 791.
John Lewis’s website took 705 purchases a minute between 9am and 10am, its busiest hour ever, while electricals site AO.com saw record sales from 9am to 1pm, with five vacuum cleaners sold a minute. A record number of people also visited Argos’s website, with a peak of 13,000 shoppers a minute.
A survey by accountants PricewaterhouseCoopers suggests three quarters of Black Friday spending will be done online.
It was a very different scene three years ago when thousands waited in the cold outside Asda and Tesco before fighting over cheap TVs. But the nation’s changed approach has not damaged sales – Barclaycard said that by 3pm, the amount spent on Black Friday was up by 8 per cent from last year. Overall £7.8billion is expected to be spent over the weekend, up by 7 per cent.
Paulette Rowe, of Barclaycard Payment Solutions, said: ‘Early data suggests shoppers have once again embraced Black Friday.’ Stores used to hold sales on Boxing Day, but many have brought this forward to Black Friday, an event started in the US.
One of the reasons behind the empty High Street yesterday could be that retailers are letting their Black Friday sales run through the weekend or even longer, meaning there’s less of a rush for bargains.
Lisa Hooker, PwC’s consumer markets leader, said it could turn into a ‘Black Fortnight’ in some sectors.
But experts warned the sales are not good for stores. Paul Martin, UK head of retail at KPMG, said Black Friday doesn’t increase sales, it simply means spending happens earlier, adding: ‘It forces retailers to sell their goods at discounted prices earlier and for longer.
‘Shoppers have become accustomed to reduced price tags, with retailers all too happy to accommodate their demands for fear of being overlooked. Clearly this is not sustainable.’
He added that retailers face huge costs in dealing with deliveries and returns.
The fact that Next is for the first time running deals of up to 70 per cent off is also seen by some as a sign of how shops feel they have no choice but to offer discounts.
Douglas Ker, of handbag brand Meli Melo, said: ‘Brands feel forced to participate in this sales bonanza. Discounting across the industry has gone completely wild.’