Black Friday Results Are In: The Centerpiece of a Huge Multi-Day ‘Bricks-and-Clicks’ Shopping Spree

Black Friday Results Are In: The Centerpiece of a Huge
Multi-Day ‘Bricks-and-Clicks’ Shopping Spree

By Brad Tuttle for
Time Magazine

Nov. 26, 2012

  If Black Friday was just a day when retailers were concerned solely with in-store sales, then Black Friday 2012 was something of a dud. But the idea of “Black Friday” has expanded far beyond a mere 24 hours, as well as the traditional in-store experience.

The retail research firm ShopperTrak estimates that shoppers spent $11.2 billion at physical stores on Black Friday. That represents a 1.8% decline from Black Friday of 2011. Does this mean that the importance of Black Friday to retailers is also on the decline?

Not remotely. What’s happened, then, is that Black Friday has grown so big that it cannot be contained in a single 24-hour period, nor are its sales and promotions limited to the stuff displayed on shelves and racks at the mall. Today, “Black Friday” begins on Thanksgiving morning (if not earlier) when retailers flood e-mail subscribers with special online shopping offers. It stretches on to Thanksgiving night, when stores open their doors for Black Friday door busters several hours before Friday has truly arrived. On through the long holiday weekend the stream of sales and promotions continues, encompassing every mode of shopping known to man.

As the Associated Press reported, in-store sales on Friday itself fell, naturally enough, directly as a result of so many stores opening on Thanksgiving night. Because shoppers were whipping out credit cards and cash at Target, Walmart, Toys R Us, and elsewhere on Thursday night, they (probably) weren’t loading up their shopping carts the following morning, the actual Friday of “Black Friday.”...Read the complete article

NRF Report: Election 2012 in review: The impact on retail

 

 

 

NRF Report: Election 2012 in review: The impact on retail

By Craig Shearman, VP, Government Affairs PR |

November 7, 2012

After $6 billion in campaign spending and a barrage of political ads in an election that hinged largely on jobs and the economy and which will impact a wide variety of public policy issues important to the retail industry, Americans woke up this morning to a familiar government. President Obama won a clear victory over former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, with a 50-48 percent lead in the popular vote and a total of 303-206 electoral votes, but voters left Congress divided.

While some news organizations reported slightly conflicting numbers this morning, the New York Times said Republicans retained their majority in the House 232-191 while Democrats remained in control of the Senate 52-45. Some races remain undecided but are not expected to affect the majority in either chamber.
While Obama’s win was decisive, it was built on slim majorities in just a handful of battleground states, and Obama is the first president reelected since Woodrow Wilson with a smaller margin in the Electoral College than his first-term election. Out of more than 120 million votes cast, the final margin of victory hinged on fewer than 360,000 votes in Florida, Ohio, Iowa, and Virginia.
As a status-quo election, it is difficult to discern a clear message from the results. The narrow nature of Obama’s reelection margin suggests more of a validation of his campaign strategy than a vindication of his first term policies, and House and Senate leadership are likely to return to familiar scripts in the next session of Congress.
Down the ballot, Senate Democrats defended their majority thanks to strong recruits in open-seat races and a series of self-inflicted wounds among Republican Senate candidates.

...Read the complete article