It's Black Friday in Western Australia. This would normally mean that a great disaster (often a horrific fire) has happened. This year it means something entirely different.Black Friday is the first official Christmas shopping day of season in the U.S. We've eaten Thanksgiving turkey, watched the holiday parade and/or football game on TV and packed up the leftovers for the following week on Thursday. But many people get the Friday after Thanksgiving Thursday off work and school as an unofficial part of the holiday. Soooooo, let's go Christmas shopping! Wooo hooo! Retailers hang their fortunes and futures on this opening weekend of Christmas shopping. Sales start earlier and earlier on Friday morning in order to get the jump on the competition. Consumers follow their cue and get in the queue for bargains or the latest kid craze toy. All expected and part of the social dance in North America.
I've watched for 10 years to see when the Christmas shopping 'season' starts in a country that does not celebrate any kind of thanksgiving at any time, let alone one near the end of November. There is no clear cut day or week for the Christmas 'season' to start here as there is back home.
This year it has all changed. Australian retailers (and more than a few consumers) have been watching retail madness on the other side of the Pacific Ocean for years. The notion of Black Friday in world with increasingly fluid commercial borders has made it less an odd novelty and more a reasonable concept. To retailers, of course. And not just large international businesses. This year is the first I've seen major domestic-only businesses tout their Black Friday sales. Lots of them, all at once as if there was some secret collusion amongst them. Or maybe they all just independently decided to jump at once at this potential commercial bonanza.
Will it work? Will this American notion (or nonsense) get a toe-hold in Australia the same way Halloween seems to have inveigled its way in--which is, through retailers primarily fueled by American movies and TV shows? Hard to say. Everyone loves a bargain and a firm holiday starting line, for that matter. But no one is getting off work today either to recover from gorging themselves on that fantastic Thanksgiving supper, visiting relatives you hope to see only once a year or to go spend money at the mall or online.
As for me, I kind of appreciate the reminder of home...as I hide my wallet from any retail temptation.
