New research published by Doddle suggests that many of the purchases made on Black Friday will not be presents for others but purchases made for the buyers themselves.
The research suggests that 40% of the items bought will be for the buyer themselves, and the promise of ‘delivery by Christmas’ won’t really wash with customers who are increasingly opting for next day delivery as part of their personal purchases.
Companies offering ‘guaranteed delivery by Christmas’ may find that they are overwhelmed by purchases with tan overnight delivery option, and this is important for the supply chain. Many couriers will have made agreements with e-commerce companies that bind them to specific delivery schedules, and with a different order structure to that forecast by many e-tailers this could make things difficult throughout the supply chain.
Doddle’s CEO Tim Robinson said, “We know from multiple studies and the success of services like Amazon’s Prime Now, that consumers increasingly want same day or next day delivery services. They are impatient for the goods they’ve spent their hard earned cash on, so offering slower delivery around Black Friday probably is not going to meet their expectations.”
With many retailers offering discounting between now and Christmas there could also be problems with January Sales where retailers offload goods at a discounted price, that have either not been sold or have been returned, because people have bought similar goods before Christmas to those they may normally buy in the January Sales. This again could cause problems in the supply chain, with businesses being unable to offload their goods after Christmas.
Robinson said of the potential supply chain issues, “Retailers will have to look at how they can tighten the returns cycle to ensure they aren’t left with vast volumes of stock returned after Black Friday waiting to be processed for resale pre-Christmas.”