Black Friday is almost here and a lot of pre-Black Friday events are already happening. It seems like that single day of discounted shopping has turned into a nightmarish weeks-long event that does not seem to end.
Businesses portrait Black Friday as the day to get the most for your money. Huge discounts or upgrades. You name it.
What they do not mention is that Black Friday is all about impulsive purchases. You browse, you see something that the site or store claims is discounted hugely, and you buy it. These may be items that you may not even need, or at least did not have on your mind when you began to shop.
Tip: you can check out my tips to survive Prime Day as well. All tips help at Black Friday and any other shopping event as well.
- Maintain a list of items that you need. The more detailed the better. Use it to shop on Black Friday.
- Compare the price of items. Not all items are at their cheapest on Black Friday. Use your mobile when shopping locally to compare prices.
- Avoid browsing or websites that list deal after deal. This leads to impulsive purchases, which you want to avoid.
- Avoid sites that use countdowns or other methods that put pressure on you.
- Research items before you buy them. Read reviews or customer comments. You can do that before the big day for items on your list.
- Don’t use just a single site for Black Friday shopping, unless it sells unique items or services.
How I handle Black Friday
In case you are wondering; I use a simple text document on my mobile phone to track the items that I need to purchase in the not-so-distant future.
I add any item to it, from household items over entertainment to apparel. It is not a huge list and there is no rush to buy these items.
Whenever a sale comes up, I check the price of each of the listed items to find bargains. If I find some, I hit the add to cart and buy buttons. If not, I keep them on the list and wait for the next sale or a situation where I need to buy them immediately.
It is simple, but it works.
Have something to add? Do you care about Black Friday or other shopping events?
My experience of Black Fridays is prices tend to increase rather than decrease and I generally don’t bother with it because of that.
Also, Black Friday always falls on the wrong day (this year on November 29) because in the Netherlands at least, credit card purchases are deducted from your account on the third day of the following month so there’s no interest free period because you buy on Friday, 29 November, it gets delivered on Tuesday, December 3 and the bank deducts from your bank balance on that very same day.