How Much Do Americans Spend on Black Friday?
Millions of Americans are looking forward to the huge sales happening on Black Friday, dubbed as the most critical shopping day of the year.
This year, Black Friday falls on Nov. 24 after Thanksgiving. This is also considered as the start of holiday shopping season. The founder and president of Brand Keys, Robert Passikoff, told NBC that an average American household is expected to spend $936 on the holidays in 2017, with half of those expended on Black Friday. Passikoff also said that over half of these will do their shopping before the event.
"Virtually half of the holiday purchases look like they're going to be made before Black Friday, and Black Friday itself is something that's just starting to become less of a beginning of the holidays, less of a specialty day in terms of sales," Passikoff said.
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According to The Balance, 101.7 million shopped on Black Friday in 2016, about 74 million more than the previous year. The next day, Saturday, more than 64 million people visited the stores. Statistics indicate that each shopper spent about $935.58, adding to the $655.8 billion total spent in 2016. This was roughly 3.6 percent more than the numbers recorded in 2015. For this year, each shopper is estimated to cough up $967.13, with a staggering $682.0 billion total amount of money spend for the event.
The money spent during the holiday season, starting from Black Friday to Christmas, reportedly make up around 30 percent of annual retail sales of the year. According to NBC News, an average shopper will be spending 6 percent more this year, about $1,226, but those who earn $100,000 a year will splurge about $1,000 more.
"Overall, consumers told us they plan to spend 6 percent more this holiday than they did last year — what's driving that, though, is very interesting. Almost all of that growth is in the upper income levels," said Steve Barr, consumer markets retail leader at PwC.
