Woodbridge shop owner boycotts Black Friday
Today is one of the biggest shopping days of the year - but the owner of New Street Market says they won't be taking part
The owners of a shop in Woodbridge tells us they're boycotting Black Friday.
Today is one of the biggest shopping days of the year - but the owner of New Street Market says they won't be taking part.
Sam Denny-Hodson, owns the clothing and homewares store, and tells us she thinks Black Friday is a marketing scam: "I strongly decided not to participate in Black Friday because I believe it's a marketing tool used by big corporations that have the margin on their product to give big disocunts.
"In other words, they're either not paying their manufacturer properly, or they're overcharging customers normally, and will discount today...
"I hope the message we send to customers is not to go along with Black Friday as they're not normally real disocunts.
"Instead, please support your local, independent shops that sell fairly made goods at fair prices."
She doesn't think her choice will put off her customers: "I hope we don't lose business because I believe our customers understand that we make products ethically and sustainably and that they pay a fair price at all times for our unique, carefully curated products."
A study into Black Friday deals
Which? is warning people to take today's deals with a pinch of salt, after their new study found that out of 208 products that they bought only 5 of them were at their cheapest price in Black Friday deals.
Items from major brands such as Amazon, Argos, Boots, Currys, John Lewis, Richer Sounds and Very were monitored 6 months before being bought and 6 months after and they calculated the price of change throughout the year.
Which? Found that Second Generation Apple AirPods headphones at both Argos and Currys were discounted from £139 to £119. However, between 25 May and 9 September the price varied from £99 – £119 meaning they were cheaper than their actual price making this one of the worst examples.
Some big brands have hit back at the findings of this study.
AO World called the research "biased" and "unbalanced", while Argos accused it of leaping to "outlandish conclusions" about its deals.