US Black Friday online sales hit record $11.8 billion, says report

American shoppers spent a record $11.8 billion online on Black Friday, up 9.1% from last year, final data from Adobe Analytics showed.

Adobe Analytics, which tracks over 1 trillion US retail site visits, expects shoppers to spend $5.5 billion on Saturday and $5.9 billion on Sunday, up 3.8% and 5.4% from a year earlier respectively.

Separately, software firm Salesforce reported that American consumers had spent $18 billion on Black Friday purchases, up 3% from a year ago, with luxury apparel and accessories among the most popular categories. Although US consumers spent more this Black Friday compared to last year, price increases hampered online demand, according to Salesforce, with shoppers purchasing fewer items at checkout compared to last year.

At physical stores, the bargain-chasing was relatively subdued on post-Thanksgiving morning, with some shoppers saying they feared overspending amid persistent inflation, trade policy-driven uncertainty, and a soft labour market. Cyber Monday, traditionally a big day for online deals, is expected to be the season’s biggest online shopping day again, Adobe projects, driving $14.2 billion in spending, up 6.3% from last year.

Separately, the economic picture hasn’t looked very rosy: Hiring has been sluggish. Consumers have been dealing with soaring meat prices. Layoffs are rippling through companies. But despite those concerns, shoppers hit the stores in full strength on Black Friday, with some even sipping champagne as they searched for discounts on the day that traditionally kicks off the holiday shopping season.

Just outside New Orleans, shoppers flooded Lakeside Shopping Center to see what deals they could find. The mall offers champagne to Black Friday traditionalists while they shop, as long as they have a receipt of at least $50.

“Sipping and shopping is the best, so I feel like that’s a New Orleans thing to do” said Lacie Lemoine, who was shopping with her grandmother, an annual tradition they’ve kept despite the fact that their budgets are shrinking.

“The economy is bad, but you still have to celebrate,” said her grandmother, Sandra Lemoine. “Everybody has to do what they can do on their own budget. That’s it.”

Both the massive Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, and Westfield Garden State Plaza in Paramus, New Jersey, reported strong customer traffic on Friday and said Black Friday would once again rank as their busiest day of the year. “We are off to a great start,” said Jill Renslow, Mall of America’s chief business development and marketing officer.

The line to enter the shopping and entertainment center started forming at 3 p.m. on Thursday, Renslow said. About 14,000 visitors entered within an hour of the mall’s 7 a.m. opening, she said.

“We are tracking one of our best Black Fridays ever,” she added.

Many retail executives have reported customers becoming more discerning and increasingly focused on deals while at the same time remaining willing to splurge for important occasions, creating a potential halo effect that might keep financial worries from discouraging holiday shoppers.

National Retail Federation CEO Matthew Shay said in early November that consumers tend to wall off holidays, whether religious, secular or bank, from outside concerns.

“It’s a sort of a category of spending that has a moat around it,” Shay said. “Shoppers view them as opportunities for celebration. I think that really captures the way the (winter) holiday season goes. People save for it. They plan for it. They prioritize it.”

While some are being cautious about this year’s Christmas expenses, others are not. Metairie, Louisiana resident Denise Thevenot says this year is no different. “I wish I could say that I had, but no, we’re just blowing it away just like we do every year. We’ll worry about that tomorrow, right? I got the receipts to show you.” Marshal Cohen, chief industry adviser at Circana, a market research firm, visited several malls on New York’s Long Island and New Jersey. He noted strong traffic and said the centers grew busier as Black Friday went on.

Cohen said Target drew lines for complimentary gift bags for the early shoppers, but overall “gone is Black Friday as we know it,” he said. “There’s no sense of urgency.”

According to Target, which aims to reverse a sales slump, 150 shoppers on average were in line at its stores for the bags filled with what it described as “goodies.” The discounter was giving away the bags for the first 100 customers who showed up for its 6am opening.

At Macy’s Herald Square flagship store in New York City, customers who streamed in soon after the store opened at 6 a.m. found deep discounts on clothes, shoes, linens and cosmetics. The footwear department discounted everything up to half off.

Nicholas Menasche, 19, from Queens, New York, shopped with his mother for shoes and clothing, and planned to head next to Best Buy for video games. Menasche, an intern at a bank, said he expected to spend around $1,200 this year on his holiday shopping, roughly the same amount as last year.

Agencies