The UK will spend £1.27bn with web-based retailers on Black Friday, says online retail association IMRG.
IMRG forecasts total online expenditure of £6.77bn over the Black Friday peak period from Monday 21 to Monday 28 November 2016.
The figures are based on UK online retail sales data from IMRG and online retail site traffic volume data from SimilarWeb.
The organisation predicts that 51 percent of that total will be completed through mobile devices (smartphones and tablets). Smartphones are expected to account for a larger share of mobile device sales than tablets for the first time.
Justin Opie, managing director at IMRG, said: “Black Friday as an event has shown a remarkable capacity for evolving each year and it seems set to change further this year.
“How the spend is spread across the days of the week depends on two things. Firstly, while there is no consensus on campaign durations among retailers, some are likely to try launching theirs earlier in the Black Friday week this year to secure their share of spend and steal a march on their competitors (indeed, some major retailers have already launched theirs).
“The other key factor concerns how shoppers actually respond – how early will they be willing to start their Christmas shopping, will many just wait until the Black Friday day itself, will they respond quickly to campaigns, pulling order volumes forward from Black Friday and potentially creating new peak days in the process? These are the questions that will shape how this period evolves in 2016.”
