Will Black Friday come at the expense of trading later in the festive period?

Black Friday, the biggest American import shopping day of the year, drives bargain hunters to the shops, giving retailers an early boost.  This year, it will will fall on November 27^th with footfall expected to be 11.5% higher when compared with last year.  Retail parks will see the strongest growth, rising by 17%, while shopping centres and high streets will see visitor growth of 12% and 9% respectively.  However, the November boost may come at the expense of sales later in the year, as shoppers do their spending earlier to capitalise on the Black Friday sales.  The weeks between Black Friday and Christmas Day saw footfall drop 1.3% last year compared to 2013, while the number of shoppers visiting stores on Boxing Day fell by 8.8%.

Diane Wehrle, insights director at Springboard said: "Despite the uplift that the new 'tradition' in our trading calendar brings for retailers, there is limited evidence of the benefit for retailers over the Christmas period as a whole.

A key issue is the likely hit on footfall in retail destinations and therefore on bricks and mortar stores that Black Friday weekend will cause on the following weeks."

With customers increasingly preferring to spend online from their home or workplace, bricks and mortar retailers are also facing increasing pressure from the growth of internet shopping.  Online spend on Black Friday is expected to hit £1.07billion in 2015, a 32% increase on last year's £810million, which would mark the first time that internet retail sales in the UK will surpass £1billion in one day.

Internet sales on Cyber Monday, the Monday that rounds off Black Friday weekend, are predicted to grow 31% to £943million, while online shopping on Boxing Day will rise 22% to £856million.