Is November the new Christmas?

11th December 2018

Is November the new Christmas?

Here in the UK, we have always had our traditional January sales, when retailers clear out the Christmas stock that hasn’t shifted over the festive period.  And then, in the summer, the July sales, as stores make space for the new  Autumn and Winter lines.

In the last decade we have embraced with gusto a tradition or two from the States – Black Friday, which was unheard of ten years ago, is now a huge in-store shopping event, with on-line retailers following closely on its heels with Cyber Monday.  Then in July, there’s Amazon Prime Day – an event which, although restricted to Amazon Prime members, has a buoyant effect across all on-line sales.

But has anyone noticed that January sales now start in December, and July sales seem to last all summer?    As for those newcomers from across the pond – well, it’s a grown from a day or two to around a fortnight of retailers trying to kickstart their Christmas sales.   

These cost-cutting events are influencing the way we shop.  According to statistics from the Office for National Statistics, in 2017, for the first time ever, retail sales were higher in November than in December. 

YouGov research by Webhelp on shopping habits looked at the shopping patterns of UK consumers around Black Friday and Cyber Monday. In 2017, Cyber Monday accounted for £1.4bn of online sales in one day.  And it’s the retailers with an on-line presence that are benefiting - ecommerce website hosting company UKFast indicate a 30% rise in traffic to its e-commerce sites over last Black Friday.  It would seem that shoppers are moving away from a chaotic high street and taking advantage of on-line deals instead – with many choosing to use their mobile to snap up the bargains.

However, we are not abandoning the high street entirely, although a new phenomenon called ‘ghost shopping’ is emerging - and it’s not good news for in-store sales. The same Webhelp study found that 20% of under 25s seek out a product in store  - but then buy on-line while in the store! 

Webhelp’s Chief Customer Solutions Officer Helen Murray explains “The rise of ghost shopping is just the latest unpredictable behaviour of British consumers. They still love both shopping and bargains but when and how they want them is changing. You could call it a form of window shopping, but now people are using the entire retail outlet as the window before they buy on-line.”

You’d be forgiven for thinking that it’s the Millennium generation that is driving the boost in online shopping.  However, the research also found that on-line shopping was now actually more popular with older customers.  Yes,  more 55 and overs said they would take advantage of Black Friday and Cyber Monday on-line sales than the under 25s.  With an ageing, yet often tech-savvy population who may have limited mobility, it makes sense that they turn to the internet for choice and convenience.
So, these sales events are driving purchases ever higher – or are they?  In other YouGov research, the findings were a little different.  This survey showed that sales days events saw a slowdown in engagement in 2017. For the first time since 2014, awareness of Black Friday experienced a significant year-on-year decline.  And it was matched by purchase levels. While 20% of people said they had bought something online for themselves in 2016 and 19% had bought something as a gift, this fell to 18% and 17% respectively in 2017.

So it would seem when we buy and how we buy may be changing, but maybe the overall amount we buy isn’t.  And as if things weren’t confusing enough for retailers here’s some more research, this time from the British Retail Consortium.  This shows that the biggest influence on consumer behaviour after the economy is – the weather.  It affects everything from consumers’ emotional state, to dictate how much they are willing to spend.  And as anyone living in Britain knows,  there’s not a lot we can do to control that!