Are British Shoppers Tired of 'Black Friday'?

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Not Christmas, not even St Andrews Day – unlike St Patrick’s Day, not really a proper excuse for gratuitous day drinking - but Black Friday. In recent years, what was once an exclusively American phenomenon of consumerism during their Thanksgiving holiday has become a veritable orgy of global hyper-capitalism, as shoppers look to take advantage of heavily discounted products.

According to a survey conducted by Finder, British shoppers are estimated to spend £4.8bn over the coming weekend, including the spin-off “Cyber Monday.” This actually represents a drop from the spend of £5.5bn recorded in the pre-pandemic days of 2019; perhaps unsurprisingly, Black Friday spending reached near £6bn during 2020 as shoppers contemplated a Christmas lockdown.

So how has an American celebration of consumerism become such an all-encompassing event in Britain over the last decade? After all, it used to be fashionable to make fun of Americans obsessed with the trappings of capitalism, especially those who find the very idea of socialist policies (universal healthcare anyone?) as unbridled anarcho-Communism. Not anymore it seems.

Indeed ‘Black Friday’ used to mean something quite different in the UK. Now rebranded as ‘Mad Friday,’ it referred to the last Friday before Christmas when emergency services would brace themselves for an influx of arrests and hospital admissions from boozy festive nights out. Contrary to the popular idea that the black in Black Friday refers to companies going “in the black” as a result of increased sales, the phrase is said to originate from police officers in Philadelphia who came to dread the traffic problems that would arise from the post-Thanksgiving shopping rush.

In the modern day – albeit perhaps less so now given the effects of the pandemic – videos of shoppers getting violent fighting over bargains had become a depressing annual indictment of Western greed and superficiality.

Does the fact that what used to be our ‘black’ Friday has been almost covertly rebranded as ‘mad’ suggest a realignment in our priorities? Or the Americanisation of our culture? The rapid expansion of internet shopping has clearly turbo boosted events like Black Friday; take an American corporate giant like Amazon. In its early days, the company focused solely on buying up online sellers of books whereas now it even has its own grocery store. Naturally, the Black Friday is a huge event for the company; the launch of the company’s Prime service in 2015 is often pinpointed as when a previously uniquely American event rocketed into global significance.

Amazon’s profits are so huge that it can allow its creator Jeff Bezos to humblebrag about how his employees and customers have funded his foray into the middle-aged billionaire space race. As convenient as it is to order something online for next day delivery (be honest, we all enjoy that), our Black Friday spending habits, whether on Amazon or otherwise, suggest that many are willing to skate over concerns about worker’s rights or the environmental impact of rapacious consumerism in the name of convenience.

Although with British shoppers estimated to spend less on products during this year’s Black Friday, does this suggest a weariness with the never-ending ways we are encouraged to spend, spend, spend on tat we don’t really need, even with heavy discounts? Or will this be the most wonderful time of the year for UK business’ looking for a much-needed boost in pandemic affected takings? Conventional wisdom probably leans towards the latter, though British shoppers could be forgiven for feeling thankful at not indulging in this year’s Black Friday craze.

PoliticsFrancesco Bonfanti