With Black Friday upon us it will be interesting to see if the Amazon Black Friday Records are broken this year. They’ve traditionally on both Prime Day and Black Friday broken all the previous records so we’re expecting no different this year. Typically soon after Black Friday Amazon announce that it was once again their busiest ever day so if the announcement doesn’t come then that will be a telling sign.
Other records worth noting are a comparison with the recent Alibaba Singles’ Day. Alibaba’s Singles’ Day was up 39% year on year and somehow we don’t think that’s achievable for Amazon although it would be fantastic to see if it happened. Amazon have a lot of competition from eBay, Argos and high street retailers who have all been running sales over the past week and unlike Singles’ Day Black Friday is now a 10 day event in the UK rather than a single day sale.
Last year Amazon announced their first Black Friday Prime Now delivery was in Birmingham when a Phillips Electric Shaver was delivered in an incredible 19 minutes and 44 seconds. Alibaba smashed that on this years’ Single’s Day with their first package delivered by Cainiao to a customer in Shanghai, within 12 minutes of kickoff (That’s from the start of the sale, not from the time the order was placed!). It’s all about closing the distance between the product and the end consumer which is why Prime Now is only available in heavily populated areas and yet to reach much of the countryside.
It’s a pretty safe bet that some of the most popular products this year will be from Amazon’s family of Echo speakers, Fire TV sticks and Fire Tablets. Amazon generally push these products heavily as they tend to tie consumers into Amazon Prime which pays dividends in sales for the rest of the year. The Echo and Echo Dot are already discounted but not the newer Echo Show which comes with a screen but this could possibly appear on sale for Friday – check back to see if there’s a deal if you’re considering making a purchase.
Much of Amazon’s success relies with the general public and if they’ve caught the Black Friday fever this year or if they’re tiring of the annual sales event. In the US things are a little different as it’s Thanksgiving and just about everyone in the States is on holiday this Thursday and so shopping is a natural pastime while waiting for the football to kick off. Here in the US people are still beavering away at work but after tomorrow we’ll know if Black Friday is still a bumper sales day (week!) or if people are waiting to spend their money closer to Christmas.
Perhaps the best indicator thus far is that MetaPack’s Peak Profile Index shows 2017 shipping volumes are roughly tracking inline with the past couple of years and if that trend continues according to plan then the next couple of days will see bumper sales across all ecommerce sites.
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I’m just as excited for Black Friday as i am for every DFS sale.