Parcel carriers are set to benefit from an 11.7% year-on-year increase in the amount spent online during the UK’s Black Friday this year. According to figures from IMRG, the UK’s industry association for e-retail, UK shoppers spent a record £1.39bn (US$1.85bn) on November 24, 2017. The 11.7% increase is ahead of the original forecast of 9% growth for the day.
Of that spend, 39% was completed on a smartphone, representing the highest share of sales against desktop and tablet devices. Posts and parcel carriers are expected to report their volumes for the Black Friday period in December.
The stronger-than-expected performance was achieved in spite of a number of factors that could have exerted a negative influence on growth, including the fact that Black Friday was relatively early in 2017, occurring before payday for more people than had been the case in recent years. Most significantly, many retailers launched their Black Friday discounting campaigns in advance of the day itself, extending the peak activity over a longer period.
As part of its research, IMRG tracked 210 retailers throughout November and logged which were running Black Friday specific campaigns and those that weren’t. The results showed that at the start of the week, there were already 77 companies actively promoting Black Friday campaigns, as well as 37 that were running their own discount campaigns.
Although marketing activity for Black Friday began to accelerate on Wednesday, this was not reflected by the growth in sales, which increased by just 2.8%, the lowest rate for any day that week. As expected, Black Friday specific campaigns peaked on the Friday with 168 of the 210 companies.
November 28, 2017