Over 4 mln Romanians interested in Black Friday, half of them want to buy something discounted

At least 4.1 million Romanians have heard of the Black Friday shopping spree and are waiting for retailers' offers in this second year of Black Friday in Romania, according to a study carried by Daedalus Millward Brown. Out of the 4.1 million, over half – 59 percent – wanted to take the opportunity to buy something on November 23. Last year, online retailer eMAG saw 2 million Romanians hunting special offers on the last shopping discount of the year, according to the retailer, and the number seems to have doubled year-on-year. The shopping day is not yet as popular in Romania as it is the US, where it has been running for years. Last year, around 226 million Americans – or over 70 percent of the total – went shopping on Black Friday to benefit from the discounted prices. eMAG expects some 700,000 visitors to the site in the first few hours of November 23, and a total of 2 million visits during the entire day. The company invested some EUR 200,000 in IT infrastructure and changed the usual order procedures internally to cope with the Black Friday high sales volumes. "If I were to compare us with traditional shops, the biggest mall in Romania has 100,000 people on its busiest days. None of the offline shops could cater to 2 million visits in one day, which is the estimated Black Friday traffic for eMAG,” said Radu Apostolescu, vicepresident and development director with eMAG. The director recommended buyers to stay at home while ordering, in order to avoid overcrowding and lost time in traffic. The Black Friday fever has taken over other type of sellers than the usual IT&C and home appliance retailers that took advantage of it last year. Now it's not only IT&C and online book stores, it's also real estate and tickets to events in Romania. The media has picked up the trend and also hopes for traffic increases, as it tries to cover more of the offers for Black Friday. Real estate developers hopped on the same train, hoping Black Friday will bring them a small boost in sales. Office owners came up with promotional offers giving away free parking spaces and even three months free of rent if somebody signs the lease on November 23. Some tourism agencies will also have special offers on November 23, with discounts of up to 40 percent on their travel packages. Mareea travel agency already announced offers 40 percent discounted. On the event tickets side, the websites biletoo.ro and blt.ro will also offer 75 percent discounts on tickets on November 23. Last year, event tickets websites sold thousand of tickets on Black Friday. eMag.ro sold EUR 8 million worth of products last year on Black Friday, when around 1.1 million people visited their website. Competitor Flanco's sales were of EUR 6 million. editor@romania-insider.com (photo source: Photoxpress.com)