More Consumers Plan to Shop Thanksgiving Weekend
Fifty-nine percent of Americans — an estimated 137.4 million people — are planning to or considering shopping during Thanksgiving weekend, according to the annual survey released yesterday by the National Retail Federation and Prosper Insights & Analytics. The numbers, which cover Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday and Small Business Saturday plus Sunday, include both in-store and online shopping. They are up from 58.7 percent, or 135.8 million people, last year. Black Friday will remain the busiest day of the holiday weekend, with 74 percent planning to shop that day, the same as in 2015.
Total Retail's Take: Despite the warnings that the recent presidential election may suppress consumer confidence and therefore spending, this report from the NRF seems to contradict that. More Americans plan to shop on Thanksgiving weekend than last year, and that's music to the ears of retailers. What I also found interesting from the survey results is that 21 percent of respondents said they planned to shop on Thanksgiving Day, just 3 percent less than those who planned to shop on Sunday. That seems to be a high percentage for Thanksgiving, although I'm guessing that tends to skew toward more online shopping — perhaps the morning of or after the big meal as people lay around on their couches.
