October 13, 2014
Are earlier Thanksgiving openings inevitable?
Joining what’s expected to be a stream of retailers making Thanksgiving a bigger holiday shopping start, Macy’s reportedly alerted associates that stores would be opening at 6 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day and sought volunteers to work.
"After careful consideration, we have decided to open at 6:00 PM (local time) on Thanksgiving," according to the e-mail sent last week to associates according to multiple media outlets. "Although this was not an easy decision, due to competitive pressure, we feel it is the right one for our customers and our company. There is no question that our customers are eager to begin their holiday shopping on Thanksgiving Day."
Macy’s declined to comment on the reports. Most retailers aren’t expected to announce Black Friday weekend hours until late October or November.
Last year, Macy’s opened 750 of its 800 stores at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving, the first time the department store operator opened on Turkey Day. In 2011, it opened at midnight on Black Friday, pulling back from a 5:00 a.m. opening.
Kohl’s, Target and Sears in similar moves last year moved up their Black Friday weekend starts to 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving. Toys "R" Us began opening on Thanksgiving in 2010 and Walmart in 2011. Kmart opened at 6 a.m. on Thanksgiving last year.
The Thanksgiving opening trend promises to lead to another string of stories lamenting associates having to miss Thanksgiving dinner.
Last year, the earlier openings supported record Black Friday weekend sales, although sales slowed in the following weeks to lead to a disappointing holiday season for many chains overall.
- A number of holiday forecasts arrived last week predicting a pickup in holiday spending this year. The Accenture Holiday Shopping Survey found consumer enthusiasm for Black Friday shopping has reached its highest level in eight years. Of those consumers planning to shop on the holiday, 47 percent said that they will be shopping in a physical store between 6:00 p.m. Thanksgiving Day and 5:00 a.m. on Black Friday. Forty-five percent planned to shop on Thanksgiving Day, up from 38 percent in 2013.
- Macy’s may be breaking with this Thanksgiving tradition – Cincinnati Business Courier
- Macy’s tells employees to brace for 6 p.m. Thanksgiving Day opening – WPXI
- Expect Retailers to Open Even Earlier This Thanksgiving – The Wall Street Journal (sub. required)
- Family-Owned Chain Wants to ‘Save Thanksgiving’ – RetailWire
- Will Anyone Shop at Kmart Before Dawn on Thanksgiving Day? – RetailWire
- Macy’s Employees to Work Thanksgiving – RetailWire
- Optimism Shines As National Retail Federation Forecasts Holiday Sales To Increase 4.1% – National Retail Federation
- U.S. Consumers Plan to Increase Holiday Spending This Year, Supported by Greater Optimism about Personal Finances, Accenture Study Finds – Accenture
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Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
What’s the earliest, if at all, stores should consider opening on Thanksgiving Day? What factors should go into decisions to do an earlier Black Friday Weekend launch?
Poll
It’s called Thanksgiving, not Thanksgetting. This trend is not a good one for retail—no matter how many jump on the band wagon
It feeds into everything shoppers say they hate about how commercial things are becoming.
As Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving today, maybe the U.S. should do likewise instead of having it next to Christmas. Look how much longer the frenetic shopping season would be.
But to the question of how early stores should open on Thanksgiving day, or to put it another way, how much earlier can we interfere with one of the rare times families actually unite in gratitude? Why, exactly, do people HAVE TO shop at a certain time on Thanksgiving? Who sparked that “entitlement?” Seems to me it’s actually the opposite of the long-forgotten purpose of the holiday.
Oh, and in addition to moving Thanksgiving to match the Canadian one, the NFL should move to a wider field and just three downs.
Macy’s crocodile tears about this decision (it wasn’t easy, competitive pressures and so on) get more disingenuous every year. Let’s be frank: Macy’s is by far the largest department store retailer in the country and one of the biggest general merchandise stores of any kind. So there is no point in being defensive about a decision to open earlier and earlier every year just because “the other guys made us do it.” Macy’s has the ability to set the tone for the industry—and to leverage its omni-channel initiatives—instead of just being a “follower.”
As I noted last year—when 8pm openings became more common—it is inevitable that many retailers will not close for Thanksgiving at all, and that day is not too far away. It’s smart brand positioning (and good employee relations) for stores like Nordstrom to keep away from the whole idea of opening on Thanksgiving Day.
Thanksgiving was created for a reason beyond retailing ambitions and fears. That reason has long since been lost by the people it was created for. But if something ails your business and you’ve decided to open your store some time on Thanksgiving Day, why not go all the way starting early, if you can recruit the help. In trade it’s as Ben Franklin said, “Time is money.”
Consumer enthusiasm for shopping on Black Friday (or Thanksgiving), good. Messing up the raison d’etre of Thanksgiving, bad.
The more that retailers move the shopping days and times earlier and earlier, the more the specialness of the holidays and the sales lose meaning.
It is an “economic” thing to make money while the iron is hot, so to speak, so why not start the holiday sales on Halloween, or earlier?
And, really, what kind of people/shoppers need to make their Thanksgiving Day begin or end with shopping? If people want to get up early and shop on Black Friday, it seems more palatable to both shoppers and workers to work at that time, but there is something unpalatable about doing it on Thanksgiving.
When a retailer is good, and I mean really good, they don’t have to play follow the leader and match store hours. They will make it up over the next month while the early bird openers fade from their sprint. Usually the weaker the retailer, the earlier the opening. Therefore if you are a disadvantaged retailer, I suggest opening as early as possible.
It is called “Black Friday” not “Black Thanksgiving.” Nevertheless retailers, like with many things, are diminishing this day. All the while, they impact the culture of the consumer.
At the same time, consumers set their own trends like “Black Monday” or “Cyber Monday” that had never been imagined just 10 years ago.
The further retailers go to either try to go along with the competitive environment or one-up each other, the more their impact and gain diminishes over time.
Consumers will set the trend and over time “Black Friday” will be as many perceive “New Year’s Eve” as the worst possible day to eat a meal out at a restaurant.
If this were all working so well, why would the best discounts be later in the season?
As I read recently, it would be great to have a designated person in every executive decision-making meeting who would say “What were you thinking?” Macy’s obviously didn’t have the designated reality checker in the room just as the other retailers didn’t.
If as a retailer, you have a compelling reason and experience, the customer will respond and reward you regardless of store hours surrounding a holiday. How many retailers have the courage to stand on that?
I am one of those who think no one should be open on Thanksgiving Day except maybe 7/11. That is tradition. I feel bad for Macy’s volunteers who walk the full length of the parade and then have to go to work on Thanksgiving Day. Friday at 6am is early enough in my book. Give the independents a chance too!
Anything for the almighty dollar. If openings keep getting earlier and earlier they are going to lose their appeal. Just another sale and just another day in the world of retailing.
Retailers are becoming the Grinch that stole Thanksgiving.
I would keep brick-and-mortar stores closed on Thanksgiving for all the reasons others have stated. I would exclusively use e-commerce as a means to engage shoppers on Thanksgiving Eve. Pre-ordering hot items, special deals and time-sensitive sales would be a nice distraction from overeating and watching the Detroit Lions lose to a team to-be-named.
The opening time is driven by the consumer. If the consumer isn’t expecting or wanting to shop on Thanksgiving Day then the retailer won’t feel compelled to open. It is purely supply and demand.
On a personal level I would rather have the stores stay closed until Black Friday, but retailers will open when the customer wants to shop.
Americans are being confronted with a series of interesting choices lately. Shop at Nordstrom, which respects Thanksgiving, or chains that don’t? Eat at McDonald’s, which retains its headquarters in the United States, or at a competitor which has chosen to avoid U.S. taxes?
We hear a lot about how mindful Millennials are. It’ll be interesting to see how they respond to these choices.
Phibbs is on it, but this is all part of the new generation that even older family members with traditions are falling into as they “friend” their own kids on Facebook.
The millennial generation, through no fault of their own (too complex for them to get anyway) has been used as a tool to extend the reach of the marketer into their lives deeper than ever before. In a way, they are spies for marketers and once the marketers own them, they become influencers that are focused on disrupting the traditional family foundations this country was built on.
Their mobile phones are the link to their life source—marketing. Families and traditions are a thing that marketers leverage and in time, will destroy.
Let’s hope some of these spies wake up someday. They will regret what they have lost, slam the door on their influencers, and come back home.
Tom
PS: Bird day at my house—no shopping on bird day. No mobiles at the table—only real cameras. And the football games are turned off for dinner.
Black Friday is theirs. Over use of internet crap while they stay at the Redd Ranch means I block their devices’ IP address from the family network. They hate that…but it works great.
Tom the Traditional Guy….
If we are going to eliminate the essence of Thanksgiving, let’s do it right, shall we? First, we watch the 5 hour Macy’s commercial that is the Parade (the parade is 3 hours but the 2-hour Today Show coverage extends it to 5), then some of us sit down to dinner in front of the device of your choice and watch football while the rest of us go out and hit the stores. This would mean that the stores would have to be open before noon so they really never deviate from their original holiday hours (example, 9 a.m. – 10 p.m.).
Instead of playing cat-and-mouse to keep everyone guessing about when they are going to open, department stores should keep their normal hours on Thanksgiving Day and leave the early openings for Black Friday.
Of course they can’t expect the same staff to work round the clock, so they should be prepared to hire extra seasonal help and the people who are year-round workers at these stores should be paid extra, since they, in effect, lose their Thanksgiving. In addition, these stores better be ready to offer killer customer service, or else the same people who appear to be so eager to shop on Thanksgiving won’t bother coming back the rest of the weekend; instead they will stay at home and shop online.
Which leads me to another consideration for why stores should keep their holiday hours consistent. The shoppers who are standing outside for a midnight or 5 a.m. store opening are not sticking around to buy items that are not “door busters.” As a matter of fact, a significant number of “door buster” items (especially electronics) are listed on eBay and other auction and commerce within 8 hours of purchase.
As for trying to limit how much one person can buy, these “resellers” simply bring hordes of family and friends who share in the excitement of snagging a great bargain, then profiting from it when consumers, who were not willing to give up their holiday dinner, start scanning websites looking for a decent deal on a flat screen TV.
This retail game has been going on since the 1930s and now that consumers know how to play the game, they will refine their strategies and eventually force retailers into truly transforming shopping into a year-long, revenue generating experience.
Once again, the Accenture Holiday Shopping Survey is full of goodies. The stat that “47% of customers surveyed plan to shop in a PHYSICAL store between 6 pm Thanksgiving Day and 5 am on Black Friday” is key. By opening at 6 pm on Thanksgiving Day, Macy’s is taking full advantage. And why not, faced with steep competition from online shopping.
Consumers want to get their holiday started, and per this report, are expected to spend an average of $718. They’re looking for the opportunity to shop in-store and be rewarded with special discounts and sales. They’re looking for a special seasonal shopping experience—in Macy’s case, kick started by the Thanksgiving Day Parade festivities earlier in the day.
What I additionally like about Macy’s is the “Thanks for Sharing” program that not only entices customers to “Shop, Save, Get Rewards” but also gives back to communities across the country, averaging $15 million each year for the past 5 years. The Make-a-Wish Foundation and the Boys & Girls Clubs are two of my favorite charities that are recipients.
This year, local Boys & Girls Clubs across the country are promoting their ties with TFS and putting out the message to shop at a participating Macy’s affiliated with their specific club. Very smart. It’s a win/win and I respect this cause-related program. It adds an extra sparkle to the Macy’s holiday shopping experience.
Decisions of this kind put everyone in a bind. Stores that feel they have to meet competition find themselves opening earlier and earlier, stores that don’t open until Friday end up looking sanctimonious when they point that out. As people used to lament “there ought to be a law,” it’s hard to imagine some legislature with too much time on their hands isn’t thinking just that.
What’s interesting to me is that the primary reason people have been “hot to shop” at opening time on Black Friday has been because of the door buster deals. With tight pocketbooks, these great deals help to make the Holidays bigger. It was not because the consumer demanded that retail open earlier and earlier to the point of infringing on Thanksgiving day itself.
If retail says, I’m opening, and the door busters are there, the consumer is going to shop whether they want to or not! Having 13 grand nieces and nephews myself, indicating a rather large family, they HATE going out on Thanksgiving, but they have to.
Come on retail, why must we do this to them? And that’s more than my 2 cents!
I know I am a dinosaur, but for crying out loud, let the employees stay home and open up on Friday early. Retailing has become a nightmare for many workers who could use an entire day with their family, but again, it doesn’t matter what I think, as the pressure for sales is enormous. We close 4 days a year, and will continue to do so, but the big stores keep pounding away to gain an edge on this Holiday madness. Sometimes it just isn’t about the money, but what do I know?
What is the optimal time for a retailer to take advantage of the holiday season’s sales potential? Depending on the retailer, the optimal time/date may be the traditional (changing rapidly) midnight/early a.m. Friday, or it may be (gasp) Thursday a.m., or the truly unspeakable (NO!) Wednesday evening.
Retailers are not in charge of societal and cultural continuity, they are businesses that are supposed to make a profit for their stakeholders. Failure to enhance the company’s profit by failing to provide shoppers with enhanced shopping experiences to satiate their desire to begin the Holiday Season early seems fiscally irresponsible.
Besides, the time off around the Thanksgiving holiday gives consumers more time to fill. There is a segment of shoppers who prefer time at the mall to sitting around, watching football and overeating–retailers should cater to this segment of shopper. Heck, take the grand kids, nieces and nephews, and uncle Ralph to the mall for some exercise and bonding time.
So, reward employees for being flexible and putting in the extra effort. Then get a jump on the competition by opening early, promoting creatively, rewarding customer traffic, and having some turkey sandwiches on hand to quench the seasonal pangs of the staff.
The retailer and consumer have a pact that is firmly in place for the Holiday Gift spending season. It mimics the political voting patterns of my home town of Chicago—early and often.
Early Thanksgiving openings have traction that has built over the past several years for the Holiday weekend. In addition, consumers are well into a thought-process about the Holiday well before Turkey Day rolls around.
The Prosper Monthly Consumer Survey of 6,500+ Adults offers the following views: 12.4% of consumers started their shopping prior to September. In September an added 8.2% of adults started their gift buying excursions. October will add another 20.6% of the population to the mix, and 38.8% of adults, 18+ will join the fray in November.
Why do people start early? The reasons vary, but the top point getters are: Need to spread gift budgets out (60.3%), Avoid Crowds at height of Season (46.5%), Avoid Stress (44.2%), Prices are too Good to pass up (41.9%) and, It gives me time to enjoy the Holidays and Season (32.3%). Better than 1 in 4 consumers say that they find Holiday ideas all year long (27.2%).
The stores will be open early on Thanksgiving. And a good number of consumers will be rolling through the doors.
I think that at a certain point, just like gas stations are open during Thanksgiving, so will retailers. With the continued cultural diversity of the US population, I do wonder if this holiday maybe observed by fewer people, therefore making it just another shopping day?
Restaurants have been open for years and years and it hasn’t been a concern. Same deal here. Retailers have to do what they have to do. For every associate who values the Thanksgiving holiday, there are just as many who are hungry for cash and prefer to be out of the house vs. washing dishes and watching football.
This is RUINING a great American Holiday. Can’t there be one day where we join as families and friends and celebrate hopefully good things and the bounty we have?
Apparently, the answer is no!
Fortunately, the openings will continue to roll backward and we will arrive shortly (and likely lead there by Kmart if it is able to survive for a few years to initiate this) to where the Thanksgiving specials will start on Wednesday night/evening!
And then perhaps Thanksgiving day might return to some semblance of a Holiday when this transpires. I can not wait—bring on wednesday night specials!!!
Aren’t customers who shop that early only interested in cheap, cheaper, cheapest? Why go after that customer?
Well, we have officially lost appreciation for what Thanksgiving represents. Are Black Friday and Cyber Monday not enough? Those are specified deal-driven shopping days created for consumers to spend their brains out during their hunt for holiday deals. Personally, I have the greatest respect for retailers and establishments that actually close down for the holidays, and am more likely to award them my business.
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It’s called Thanksgiving, not Thanksgetting. This trend is not a good one for retail—no matter how many jump on the band wagon
It feeds into everything shoppers say they hate about how commercial things are becoming.
As Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving today, maybe the U.S. should do likewise instead of having it next to Christmas. Look how much longer the frenetic shopping season would be.
But to the question of how early stores should open on Thanksgiving day, or to put it another way, how much earlier can we interfere with one of the rare times families actually unite in gratitude? Why, exactly, do people HAVE TO shop at a certain time on Thanksgiving? Who sparked that “entitlement?” Seems to me it’s actually the opposite of the long-forgotten purpose of the holiday.
Oh, and in addition to moving Thanksgiving to match the Canadian one, the NFL should move to a wider field and just three downs.
Macy’s crocodile tears about this decision (it wasn’t easy, competitive pressures and so on) get more disingenuous every year. Let’s be frank: Macy’s is by far the largest department store retailer in the country and one of the biggest general merchandise stores of any kind. So there is no point in being defensive about a decision to open earlier and earlier every year just because “the other guys made us do it.” Macy’s has the ability to set the tone for the industry—and to leverage its omni-channel initiatives—instead of just being a “follower.”
As I noted last year—when 8pm openings became more common—it is inevitable that many retailers will not close for Thanksgiving at all, and that day is not too far away. It’s smart brand positioning (and good employee relations) for stores like Nordstrom to keep away from the whole idea of opening on Thanksgiving Day.
Thanksgiving was created for a reason beyond retailing ambitions and fears. That reason has long since been lost by the people it was created for. But if something ails your business and you’ve decided to open your store some time on Thanksgiving Day, why not go all the way starting early, if you can recruit the help. In trade it’s as Ben Franklin said, “Time is money.”
Consumer enthusiasm for shopping on Black Friday (or Thanksgiving), good. Messing up the raison d’etre of Thanksgiving, bad.
The more that retailers move the shopping days and times earlier and earlier, the more the specialness of the holidays and the sales lose meaning.
It is an “economic” thing to make money while the iron is hot, so to speak, so why not start the holiday sales on Halloween, or earlier?
And, really, what kind of people/shoppers need to make their Thanksgiving Day begin or end with shopping? If people want to get up early and shop on Black Friday, it seems more palatable to both shoppers and workers to work at that time, but there is something unpalatable about doing it on Thanksgiving.
When a retailer is good, and I mean really good, they don’t have to play follow the leader and match store hours. They will make it up over the next month while the early bird openers fade from their sprint. Usually the weaker the retailer, the earlier the opening. Therefore if you are a disadvantaged retailer, I suggest opening as early as possible.
It is called “Black Friday” not “Black Thanksgiving.” Nevertheless retailers, like with many things, are diminishing this day. All the while, they impact the culture of the consumer.
At the same time, consumers set their own trends like “Black Monday” or “Cyber Monday” that had never been imagined just 10 years ago.
The further retailers go to either try to go along with the competitive environment or one-up each other, the more their impact and gain diminishes over time.
Consumers will set the trend and over time “Black Friday” will be as many perceive “New Year’s Eve” as the worst possible day to eat a meal out at a restaurant.
If this were all working so well, why would the best discounts be later in the season?
As I read recently, it would be great to have a designated person in every executive decision-making meeting who would say “What were you thinking?” Macy’s obviously didn’t have the designated reality checker in the room just as the other retailers didn’t.
If as a retailer, you have a compelling reason and experience, the customer will respond and reward you regardless of store hours surrounding a holiday. How many retailers have the courage to stand on that?
I am one of those who think no one should be open on Thanksgiving Day except maybe 7/11. That is tradition. I feel bad for Macy’s volunteers who walk the full length of the parade and then have to go to work on Thanksgiving Day. Friday at 6am is early enough in my book. Give the independents a chance too!
Anything for the almighty dollar. If openings keep getting earlier and earlier they are going to lose their appeal. Just another sale and just another day in the world of retailing.
Retailers are becoming the Grinch that stole Thanksgiving.
I would keep brick-and-mortar stores closed on Thanksgiving for all the reasons others have stated. I would exclusively use e-commerce as a means to engage shoppers on Thanksgiving Eve. Pre-ordering hot items, special deals and time-sensitive sales would be a nice distraction from overeating and watching the Detroit Lions lose to a team to-be-named.
The opening time is driven by the consumer. If the consumer isn’t expecting or wanting to shop on Thanksgiving Day then the retailer won’t feel compelled to open. It is purely supply and demand.
On a personal level I would rather have the stores stay closed until Black Friday, but retailers will open when the customer wants to shop.
Americans are being confronted with a series of interesting choices lately. Shop at Nordstrom, which respects Thanksgiving, or chains that don’t? Eat at McDonald’s, which retains its headquarters in the United States, or at a competitor which has chosen to avoid U.S. taxes?
We hear a lot about how mindful Millennials are. It’ll be interesting to see how they respond to these choices.
Phibbs is on it, but this is all part of the new generation that even older family members with traditions are falling into as they “friend” their own kids on Facebook.
The millennial generation, through no fault of their own (too complex for them to get anyway) has been used as a tool to extend the reach of the marketer into their lives deeper than ever before. In a way, they are spies for marketers and once the marketers own them, they become influencers that are focused on disrupting the traditional family foundations this country was built on.
Their mobile phones are the link to their life source—marketing. Families and traditions are a thing that marketers leverage and in time, will destroy.
Let’s hope some of these spies wake up someday. They will regret what they have lost, slam the door on their influencers, and come back home.
Tom
PS: Bird day at my house—no shopping on bird day. No mobiles at the table—only real cameras. And the football games are turned off for dinner.
Black Friday is theirs. Over use of internet crap while they stay at the Redd Ranch means I block their devices’ IP address from the family network. They hate that…but it works great.
Tom the Traditional Guy….
If we are going to eliminate the essence of Thanksgiving, let’s do it right, shall we? First, we watch the 5 hour Macy’s commercial that is the Parade (the parade is 3 hours but the 2-hour Today Show coverage extends it to 5), then some of us sit down to dinner in front of the device of your choice and watch football while the rest of us go out and hit the stores. This would mean that the stores would have to be open before noon so they really never deviate from their original holiday hours (example, 9 a.m. – 10 p.m.).
Instead of playing cat-and-mouse to keep everyone guessing about when they are going to open, department stores should keep their normal hours on Thanksgiving Day and leave the early openings for Black Friday.
Of course they can’t expect the same staff to work round the clock, so they should be prepared to hire extra seasonal help and the people who are year-round workers at these stores should be paid extra, since they, in effect, lose their Thanksgiving. In addition, these stores better be ready to offer killer customer service, or else the same people who appear to be so eager to shop on Thanksgiving won’t bother coming back the rest of the weekend; instead they will stay at home and shop online.
Which leads me to another consideration for why stores should keep their holiday hours consistent. The shoppers who are standing outside for a midnight or 5 a.m. store opening are not sticking around to buy items that are not “door busters.” As a matter of fact, a significant number of “door buster” items (especially electronics) are listed on eBay and other auction and commerce within 8 hours of purchase.
As for trying to limit how much one person can buy, these “resellers” simply bring hordes of family and friends who share in the excitement of snagging a great bargain, then profiting from it when consumers, who were not willing to give up their holiday dinner, start scanning websites looking for a decent deal on a flat screen TV.
This retail game has been going on since the 1930s and now that consumers know how to play the game, they will refine their strategies and eventually force retailers into truly transforming shopping into a year-long, revenue generating experience.
Once again, the Accenture Holiday Shopping Survey is full of goodies. The stat that “47% of customers surveyed plan to shop in a PHYSICAL store between 6 pm Thanksgiving Day and 5 am on Black Friday” is key. By opening at 6 pm on Thanksgiving Day, Macy’s is taking full advantage. And why not, faced with steep competition from online shopping.
Consumers want to get their holiday started, and per this report, are expected to spend an average of $718. They’re looking for the opportunity to shop in-store and be rewarded with special discounts and sales. They’re looking for a special seasonal shopping experience—in Macy’s case, kick started by the Thanksgiving Day Parade festivities earlier in the day.
What I additionally like about Macy’s is the “Thanks for Sharing” program that not only entices customers to “Shop, Save, Get Rewards” but also gives back to communities across the country, averaging $15 million each year for the past 5 years. The Make-a-Wish Foundation and the Boys & Girls Clubs are two of my favorite charities that are recipients.
This year, local Boys & Girls Clubs across the country are promoting their ties with TFS and putting out the message to shop at a participating Macy’s affiliated with their specific club. Very smart. It’s a win/win and I respect this cause-related program. It adds an extra sparkle to the Macy’s holiday shopping experience.
Decisions of this kind put everyone in a bind. Stores that feel they have to meet competition find themselves opening earlier and earlier, stores that don’t open until Friday end up looking sanctimonious when they point that out. As people used to lament “there ought to be a law,” it’s hard to imagine some legislature with too much time on their hands isn’t thinking just that.
What’s interesting to me is that the primary reason people have been “hot to shop” at opening time on Black Friday has been because of the door buster deals. With tight pocketbooks, these great deals help to make the Holidays bigger. It was not because the consumer demanded that retail open earlier and earlier to the point of infringing on Thanksgiving day itself.
If retail says, I’m opening, and the door busters are there, the consumer is going to shop whether they want to or not! Having 13 grand nieces and nephews myself, indicating a rather large family, they HATE going out on Thanksgiving, but they have to.
Come on retail, why must we do this to them? And that’s more than my 2 cents!
I know I am a dinosaur, but for crying out loud, let the employees stay home and open up on Friday early. Retailing has become a nightmare for many workers who could use an entire day with their family, but again, it doesn’t matter what I think, as the pressure for sales is enormous. We close 4 days a year, and will continue to do so, but the big stores keep pounding away to gain an edge on this Holiday madness. Sometimes it just isn’t about the money, but what do I know?
What is the optimal time for a retailer to take advantage of the holiday season’s sales potential? Depending on the retailer, the optimal time/date may be the traditional (changing rapidly) midnight/early a.m. Friday, or it may be (gasp) Thursday a.m., or the truly unspeakable (NO!) Wednesday evening.
Retailers are not in charge of societal and cultural continuity, they are businesses that are supposed to make a profit for their stakeholders. Failure to enhance the company’s profit by failing to provide shoppers with enhanced shopping experiences to satiate their desire to begin the Holiday Season early seems fiscally irresponsible.
Besides, the time off around the Thanksgiving holiday gives consumers more time to fill. There is a segment of shoppers who prefer time at the mall to sitting around, watching football and overeating–retailers should cater to this segment of shopper. Heck, take the grand kids, nieces and nephews, and uncle Ralph to the mall for some exercise and bonding time.
So, reward employees for being flexible and putting in the extra effort. Then get a jump on the competition by opening early, promoting creatively, rewarding customer traffic, and having some turkey sandwiches on hand to quench the seasonal pangs of the staff.
The retailer and consumer have a pact that is firmly in place for the Holiday Gift spending season. It mimics the political voting patterns of my home town of Chicago—early and often.
Early Thanksgiving openings have traction that has built over the past several years for the Holiday weekend. In addition, consumers are well into a thought-process about the Holiday well before Turkey Day rolls around.
The Prosper Monthly Consumer Survey of 6,500+ Adults offers the following views: 12.4% of consumers started their shopping prior to September. In September an added 8.2% of adults started their gift buying excursions. October will add another 20.6% of the population to the mix, and 38.8% of adults, 18+ will join the fray in November.
Why do people start early? The reasons vary, but the top point getters are: Need to spread gift budgets out (60.3%), Avoid Crowds at height of Season (46.5%), Avoid Stress (44.2%), Prices are too Good to pass up (41.9%) and, It gives me time to enjoy the Holidays and Season (32.3%). Better than 1 in 4 consumers say that they find Holiday ideas all year long (27.2%).
The stores will be open early on Thanksgiving. And a good number of consumers will be rolling through the doors.
I think that at a certain point, just like gas stations are open during Thanksgiving, so will retailers. With the continued cultural diversity of the US population, I do wonder if this holiday maybe observed by fewer people, therefore making it just another shopping day?
Restaurants have been open for years and years and it hasn’t been a concern. Same deal here. Retailers have to do what they have to do. For every associate who values the Thanksgiving holiday, there are just as many who are hungry for cash and prefer to be out of the house vs. washing dishes and watching football.
This is RUINING a great American Holiday. Can’t there be one day where we join as families and friends and celebrate hopefully good things and the bounty we have?
Apparently, the answer is no!
Fortunately, the openings will continue to roll backward and we will arrive shortly (and likely lead there by Kmart if it is able to survive for a few years to initiate this) to where the Thanksgiving specials will start on Wednesday night/evening!
And then perhaps Thanksgiving day might return to some semblance of a Holiday when this transpires. I can not wait—bring on wednesday night specials!!!
Aren’t customers who shop that early only interested in cheap, cheaper, cheapest? Why go after that customer?
Well, we have officially lost appreciation for what Thanksgiving represents. Are Black Friday and Cyber Monday not enough? Those are specified deal-driven shopping days created for consumers to spend their brains out during their hunt for holiday deals. Personally, I have the greatest respect for retailers and establishments that actually close down for the holidays, and am more likely to award them my business.