Every year, Black Friday, the famous sales weekend that introduces the much-awaited Christmas creep, marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season. Since its inception, Black Friday sales have made high street retailers, supermarket stores and online commerce websites witness a dramatic increase in consumer footfall. Best deals, availability of products at a quarter of their recommended retail price, wide assortment and great add-ons have turned Black Friday into a shopping extravaganza which is only expected to gain more momentum in the coming years. Although the day might be black for everyone, it is certainly green for the buzzing cash tills.

According to CNBC, Black Friday in 2018, pulled in a record-breaking £5.5B, which was a clear jump of 23.6% from 2017. A large part of the sales was attributed to smartphones and expensive consumer electronics which accounted for a whopping £1.8 Billion in sales. Interestingly, 33.5 percent of sales stem from online platforms.

Deemed as shopping festivals across the globe, thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday provide the much-needed boost to the retail sector which struggles to recover its cost of operations in the normal days. Businesses have reported a humongous amount of proliferation in their profits on sale days when compared to normal business days.

According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), Black Friday this year is expected to witness a growth of 4.1 percent over the last year, with consumers anticipated to spend a massive £2.2 Billion more than 2018.

Mentioned below is a year-on-year account for the amount spent per shopper on Black Friday.

Although, it is quite clear from the statistics above that Black Friday is successful due to the sheer amount of discounts it offers, however, is it just about the discounts?

One misconception that circles around Black Friday are that shoppers are motivated by, and hunt for products with huge deals, thus resulting in a stampede like situation around the globe. However, according to a consumer psychologist at Golden Gate University, Kit Yarrow through her research found out that although deals and discounts provide motivation to shoppers to a certain level, however, it is the tradition that draws them to stand in lines for hours outside supermarkets.

Shopping after Thanksgiving has been a tradition in the west, and the availability of deals does not influence the whole notion of shopping. She believes that even if Black Friday is expunged out of the system, it will hardly make any impact on the shopping intention of people who are driven by the zeal of tradition and not because of the greed of discounts.