UK retailers are expected to see a boost in footfall on Black Friday (29 Nov 2024), with the lure of discounts unlocking pent-up post-payday spending, after many shoppers held back on purchasing in October in order to bag Black Friday deals, according to the latest data from RetailNext, the leading analytics solution for bricks-and-mortar retailers.
Original data from RetailNext’s UK shopper traffic index, which captures billions of store visits globally each year, suggests that footfall on Black Friday is expected to rise +2% year-on-year.
“Black Friday is now an established festival of discounting, with many retailers offering up an entire month of discounting and some even starting Black Friday promotions as early as October,” Gary Whittemore, Head of Sales EMEA & APAC at RetailNext, commented. “But while Black Friday discounting has become longer and more drawn-out, this hasn’t taken the shine off the event as a driver of in-store footfall performance, with the lure of bargains tempting shoppers to make store visits to pick-up deals. And, with retailers also looking to sell-through on excess stocks after unseasonable weather earlier in 2024, shoppers may find even more discounts available this year over a greater assortment of goods.”
As spending-caution remains rife among consumers, many shoppers held off making purchases in October in anticipation for Back Friday discounts, with the BRC reporting last month total retailer sales grew by just +0.6% year-on-year, significantly weaker than September’s retail revenues.
In addition to Black Friday deals helping to unlock pent-up demand as shoppers start to snap up cut-price Christmas gifts, Black Friday performance is also expected to benefit from the discounting event falling after payday this year. With Black Friday taking place a week later (week 48 in 2024 vs week 47 in 2023), GlobalData estimates that a post-payday Black Friday will see UK shoppers spending over £9billion over the four-day Black Friday weekend, up +4.5% year-on-year. The analyst also expects physical stores to increase share of spend for the first time since 2022, rising by +1.9% to take their total share of spending to 46.9%, as online shopping levels have started to stabilise, correcting back to post-pandemic volumes.
As well as on-line and off-line spending levels stabilising, the prevalence of deals being heavily promoted online is also helping to draw more shoppers into bricks-and-mortar stores. Original research of over 1,000 UK shoppers by RetailNext suggests that 43% have visited a physical store to search for deals after seeing Black Friday discounts advertised to them online, rising to 67% of Gen Z.
“As Black Friday has got bigger and bigger, consumers want to check where they can get the best bargains across channels, including the store,” Whittemore added. “This is why, increasingly, we’re seeing even more of a halo-effect in store footfall, driven by the discounts that are being heavily advertised online.”
