Wal-Mart and Its Rivals Have Left Black Friday Behind

We’re about to be inundated with news about Black Friday, the big shopping day after Thanksgiving. But feel free to ignore it, since retailers actually launched the holiday season weeks ago.

Back on Aug. 14, for instance, Sam’s Club fired the first shot when it said it would help holiday caterers develop trendy menu options. On Oct. 1, Wal-Mart announced price rollbacks on a range of popular toys, and by Oct. 23, it was talking up supercenter holiday shops. But Wal-Mart’s real Christmas push began on Nov. 5 with a full-blown Yuletide assault — featuring a seven-week campaign with weekly promotions Wal-Mart says will save consumers $200 million.

In effect, Wal-Mart told consumers: Why wait? We’ve got bargains right now. Wal-Mart’s strategy of pushing back the holiday season, pursued over the past several years, is the retailer’s declaration that it owns the holidays. It sets the prices. It establishes the trends.

Its retail rivals can’t afford to do other than respond as best they can:

• On Nov. 2, Kmart initiated a sweepstakes promotion designed to keep consumers focused on its Disney product by offering both grand and weekly prizes.
• On Nov. 3, Target launched an expansion of its charity-linked, low-price gift promotion Nice Twice. Gifts for a Cause, providing shoppers with an early chance to purchase feel-good presents linked to the Salvation Army and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
• On Nov. 9, Macy’s rolled out its seasonal advertising campaign, dubbed Believe, featuring product partners Jessica Simpson, Martha Stewart, Carlos Santana, Donald Trump, Tommy Hilfiger and Kenneth Cole, along with a corresponding microsite that encourages visitors to turn themselves into snow globe Santas and send their friends a holiday — and Macy’s — message. Oh, and to start shopping.

The dilution of Black Friday doesn’t end there. Kmart is keeping its stores open on Thanksgiving this year. Wal-Mart, while too All-American to operate through Turkey Day, is repeating a three-day promotion encouraging consumers to spend some of Thursday at Wal-Mart.com. JCPenney, employing a similar tactic, launched its Black Friday sale today at JCPenney.com.

Black Friday, of course, still fascinates the media. Local TV stations, in particular, love to film shoppers at the mall and then serve up talking heads who caution that one good day doesn’t make a holiday season. The National Retail Federation’s annual holiday-sales predictions are also a perennial whipping boy. This year, NRF predicts that consumers will, on average, spend $832.36 on the holidays. That’s about 1.9 percent more than they shelled out last year, an increase the organization characterizes, perhaps disingenuously, as “paltry.” Other predictions are grimmer.

This year, Black Friday may be particularly disappointing. The economy stinks, people are nervous and $5 gifts are getting the promotional treatment at dollar stores, drug chains and other locations shoppers encounter every day, affecting sales and consumer expectations. But whether pundits predict doom or salvation in Black Friday’s wake, it’s just not the holiday shopping imperative it once was.