Did you know that every single year between 16 and 19 million people in Canada flood the malls in order to make the best of the sales during the Black Friday/Cyber Monday?
The interesting fact is that, Moneris, Canada’s largest processor of credit and debit card payments, claims spending on both days has grown consistently since 2011 and for the past few years, Canadians have spent more on Black Friday then on Boxing Day.
But, before we get into the interesting facts about how Canadians like to buy and what items are on their priority lists, let’s explain why black. Have you ever wondered?
The term has to do with the stock market crash back into the 1800’s.
It was used for the first time on 24th September 1869. The government of America flooded the market with gold at the New York Stock Exchange, causing prices to fall – therefore many investors lost their fortune. Due to this unfortunate circumstances the Friday was named black.
There is also an interesting report from the NY Times, that in 1961. one newspaper from Philadelphia tried to rename the day as Big Friday, but this term didn’t stick around long.
The reason for this was the fact the police had become frustrated with the traffic congestion caused by shoppers on that day. Though it had been popular for a while, Black Friday was not an official national term until the 1990’s.
More and more shopping on Canada on these days is done online. The main reason is, of course, to avoid chaos in the stores.
Popular website eBay Canada says it’s site traffic has increased steadily over the past five years on Black Friday, and since 2013, Cyber Monday has been the company’s busiest day when it comes to site visits. Also, buyers are not only using their laptops, but are often heading for their smartphones in order to make online purchase. In the last two years, according to Google Canada, mobile shopping-related searches almost surpassed those on desktop computers.
The good news for Canada’s economy is that, probably, this year too, most of the money spent by passionate buyers will stay in the country. Many companies claim Canadians want to shop locally in order to support local retailers while also avoiding international shipping costs, taxes, duties and an unfavourable exchange rate.
So, what is that people of Canada buy the most?
Well, according to eBay Canada, electronics are number one! All sorts of gadgets were the most purchased items on eBay last year. Also, about ten gaming systems were bought every hour during Cyber Week by Canadians. Twitter Canada agrees with these statistics saying one of the most popular items in the last two years were consumer electronics or home appliances. Top ten list also includes Petro Canada gas cards, mini wireless keybords, 2 GB flash memory cards, iPhone 6 case etc.
According to Qualtrics the iPhone 7 was the most desirable tech gift last year.
Let’s wait and see what is going to be the market’s teaser number one on the Black Friday/Cyber Monday 2017.
