Should retailers do Black Friday?
The latest Daily Maverick piece explores the question.
Black Friday benefits are tenuous, even for the big retailers
Large retail systems are, by design, optimised to accommodate a steady flow of appropriately behaved customers. Sharp spikes in customer demand, like during Black Friday, put unmanageable amounts of stress on these systems and the people who operate them.
Taking a big step back what's become quite clear is that the dominant mindset leading retail these days is significantly skewed towards 'accounting success' as opposed to 'marketing success'.
Great strategic marketers have clearly lost their seat at the retail table and in their place are the bean counters. Bean counters however run companies looking backwards not forwards.
Opportunity? Oh yes.