Retailers entered the 2023 holiday season amid U.S. consumer spending jitters. With pressures such as student loan payment resumption and higher interest rates looming over holiday spending budgets, how did Black Friday week sales fare in 2023? Bloomberg Second Measure’s consumer transaction data analytics show that observed U.S. sales at Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN) grew double-digits year-over-year during the 2023 Black Friday week. Meanwhile, results at big-box retailers traditionally known for their Black Friday doorbuster deals—Walmart Inc (NYSE: WMT), Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT), and Best Buy Co Inc (NYSE: BBY)—were mixed. Additionally, we found that, among the analyzed companies, Walmart Inc had the highest observed market share during Black Friday week in 2023, while Amazon.com Inc’s share of observed sales grew the most year-over-year.
Amazon.com Inc’s (NASDAQ: AMZN) observed U.S. consumer sales growth accelerated year-over-year during Black Friday week in 2023
Consumer transaction data analytics show that between Black Friday weeks in 2022 and 2023, Amazon.com Inc’s observed U.S. consumer sales increased 10 percent. Among big-box retailers in our analysis, observed sales increased only at Walmart Inc. Compared with Black Friday week in 2022, Walmart Inc’s observed sales were up 2 percent. On the other hand, observed sales at Target Corporation and Best Buy Co Inc decreased 12 percent and 15 percent, respectively.
Amazon.com Inc’s observed U.S. consumer sales also increased year-over-year during Black Friday weeks in 2021 and 2022, albeit at a single-digit clip. During the week of Black Friday in 2022, the ecommerce giant’s observed U.S. sales were up 3 percent year-over-year, while during the comparable week in 2021, its observed sales were up 5 percent year-over-year.
Walmart Inc’s observed U.S. sales also increased between Black Friday weeks in 2021 and 2022. However, the company’s year-over-year observed sales growth decelerated over that period. During Black Friday week in 2021, Walmart Inc’s observed sales were up 8 percent year-over-year and during the same week a year later, were up 6 percent.
Meanwhile, Target Corporation’s observed sales were 3 percent higher year-over-year during Black Friday week in 2021 than in 2020, but remained relatively unchanged year-over-year during Black Friday week in 2022.
Best Buy Co Inc’s observed sales decreased year-over-year during Black Friday weeks both in 2021 and 2022 and were down 17 percent and 5 percent, respectively.
Notably, the big-box retailers in our analysis have been closed on Thanksgiving since 2020.
Walmart Inc (NYSE: WMT) had the biggest share of observed U.S. sales during Black Friday in 2023, but Amazon.com Inc’s share grew the most year-over-year
As in previous years, during Black Friday week in 2023, Walmart Inc earned the biggest share of observed sales among the companies in our analysis. The company’s observed market share during Black Friday week in 2023, at 50 percent, was about the same as in 2022.
At the same time, Amazon.com Inc’s share of observed sales among this peer group increased during Black Friday week in 2023, compared with the corresponding week in 2022, following the jump in observed U.S. consumer sales over that period. In 2023, the company earned 40 percent of observed U.S. sales during Black Friday week, while in 2022, its share of sales was 37 percent.
By contrast, Target Corporation’s and Best Buy Co Inc’s observed market shares decreased between Black Friday week in 2022 and 2023. Target Corporation’s observed market share during Black Friday week in 2023 was 7 percent, compared to 9 percent a year earlier. Meanwhile, Best Buy Co Inc’s observed market share decreased from 4 percent to 3 percent over the same period.
How will Amazon.com Inc’s and big-box retailers’ sales fare throughout the rest of the 2023 holiday season?
While Amazon.com Inc did not issue a 2023 holiday season outlook, earlier in November 2023, Walmart Inc sounded a note of caution regarding its 2023 holiday sales outlook amid expected deflation. Target Corporation warned that its 2023 holiday season sales might decline by mid-single digits, as shoppers purchase fewer discretionary items like furniture and electronics. Similarly, days ahead of Black Friday in 2023, Best Buy Co Inc warned that its same store-store sales might fall between 3 percent and 7 percent and pointed to “difficult to predict” consumer demand. Black Friday in 2023 did not turn out to be as bleak as some analysts predicted, whether this will also be the case for the whole holiday season in 2023 remains to be seen.
Bloomberg Second Measure launched a new and exclusive transaction dataset in July 2022. Our data continues to be broadly representative of U.S. consumers. As a result of this panel change, however, we recommend using only the latest post in assessing metrics, and do not support referring to historical blog posts to infer period-over-period comparisons.
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