Will Cyber Monday 2010 Be Bigger Than Black Friday?
As the great recession of '09/10 kicks into high gear this upcoming holiday season, traditional retailers are certainly going to scratch and scrape for every consumer dollar available. Things traditionally kick off into high gear around Thanksgiving friday, otherwise know as Black Friday. The term Black Friday was coined early on as it was typically the day when most retailers were 'in the black' for the year. Lately, Black Friday has featured early bird specials and midnight opennings that draw some of the largest crowds for the season.
A few years ago, a phenomenon known as Cyber Monday has joined Black Friday as a great day to score online deals. Cyber Monday has several definitions, the first being the Monday following Black Friday. As office workers settle back into 'work' on Monday, they are greated with cyber monday deals that both brick and morter & online only merchants feature on their web sites. In addition, Cyber Mondays are also considered every Monday (following Black Friday) leading up to Christmas.
Several factors could contribute to Cyber Monday continuing to see growth this year:
- Taxes
- This might be one of the final 'hurrah' years for online merchants such as Amazon.com to offer tax free deals on merchandise. As state revenues continue to decline, will this be the last year for this tax 'loophole'?
- Price of Gasoline
- It is up, it is down, but generally it cost money and time to hit all those Black Friday specials across American suburbs.
- Retailer Bankruptcy
- As more traditional brick and morter retailers go belly up (Circuit City, Linen & Things, etc.) there will certainly be less Black Friday bargains to be had. This will particulary affect the smaller strip malls that no longer have big retailer 'anchor stores' to draw in crowds.
So all told, Cyber Monday is a very long way off from taking over for Black Friday sales dominance, but perhaps 2010 might be the tipping point?
What do you think?