Walmart Stretches Black Friday And Cyber Monday To 14 Days; Actual Friday Asks What It Did Wrong
The retailer's holiday deals now run in three waves from Nov. 12 to Dec. 2. The day the event is named after has requested a meeting with HR.
BENTONVILLE, Ark.—Walmart announced Monday that its Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals will run for 14 days this year across three separate events, leaving the original Friday, a single 24-hour period that once had the whole thing to itself, to ask colleagues whether it had been doing something wrong all these years.
According to Retail Dive, early deals begin Nov. 12 and run through Nov. 15. Black Friday deals follow from Nov. 23 to Nov. 29, and Cyber Monday deals run from Nov. 30 to Dec. 2. That is 14 days in total, up from 10 last year. Walmart+ members get early access, and the company says shoppers will find thousands of gifts under $20. It did not name specific products, which retail analysts described as the most suspenseful part.
Friday, reached at its home between Thursday and Saturday, said it learned the news the same way everyone else did. "I used to be the day," said Friday, a fictional day of the week. "People slept in tents for me. Now I am one of seven Black Fridays, and the other six are not even Fridays. One of them is a Monday. I have met him. He is very nice. That is the worst part."
Under the new calendar, a Black Friday deal can now be purchased on a Wednesday, a Cyber Monday deal can be purchased on a Tuesday, and an early Black Friday deal can be purchased so early that it is technically mid November, a period historians previously classified as "the leftover Halloween candy era."
"I used to be the day. Now I am one of seven Black Fridays, and the other six are not even Fridays."
Shoppers said they appreciated the extra time, in the way one appreciates a meeting that has been extended. "I have to pace myself now," said Donna Krebbs, 52, a fictional shopper in Rogers, Ark., who said she has already built a spreadsheet. "On the first wave I buy the TV. On the second wave I buy the same TV in case it got cheaper. On the third wave I return the first TV. My husband calls it a strategy. I call it November."
A survey of 900 fictional shoppers by The Daily SKU found that 41% could no longer say which day Black Friday is, 27% believed it was "a vibe that lasts about two weeks," and 9% said they had been shopping Black Friday deals since August without realizing it. Only 6% said it was the Friday after Thanksgiving, and that group was described by researchers as "old fashioned, and correct."
Continued on page A6, which is also having a sale, through Dec. 2
