This week formally begins the high sales season for the main retail businesses in the United States with the traditional shopping day of Black Friday and that will culminate in Christmas .
Millions of Americans expect deep discounts on all kinds of items that generally don’t have a sale until this time of year, where they can find discounts that exceed 50%.
But despite the optimism of buyers, for Steve Sadove , a senior advisor to Mastercard and former president and CEO of Saks, the wave of discounts typically seen this season won’t be as big as Americans want.
“The discounts are not as deep as in the past. I guess you are seeing 5 to 10 percentage points less discount in the environment ”, he told Yahoo, on the eve of this Black Friday 2021.
“Partly because inventories are online and partly because of supply chain problems . I see a lot of key items selling early. People are going out and getting the items quickly because they know they are going to run out. ”
Despite this prediction, many retail analysts are expecting this year-end shopping season increase, compared to last year, and set new highs, with rising consumer demand and high savings levels thanks to the federal stimulus that occurred at the beginning of 2021.
But despite the fact that Americans have purchasing power and the desire to spend, the big question has to do with whether retailers manage to meet rising consumer demand, due to supply chain disruptions .
Adjusted inventory levels and the labor shortage leading to the peak holiday shopping season. These supply-side concerns could discourage companies from offering significant discounts while trying to pass the higher costs on to consumers and preserve margins.
Since it was announced that there would be a shortage of products, Americans went out to make purchases in recent months to have what they need for Christmas and the holidays.
A test of the above Commerce Department report last week showed that retail sales grew 1.7% better than expected in October month-over-month, representing the biggest jump since March.
You may also be interested in: Black Friday 2021 on Amazon: Flagship TV of 24 ″ with 40% discount to only $ 99. 99 and other discounts on televisions and screens