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Canal Walk in Cape Town. Photo: Andrew Thompson
- Visits to shopping centers on Black Friday were 13% lower than last year, new data from Tracker and Lightstone confirmed.
- South Africa’s large shopping malls registered a 20% drop.
- Gateway Mall in Umhlanga recorded the highest volume of visits on Black Friday.
- For more articles, visit www.BusinessInsider.co.za.
Small shopping malls were less affected, but in South Africa there was a sharp drop in in-store purchases on Black Friday, new data from property analytics firm Lightstone and vehicle tracking service Tracker has confirmed.
In-store card purchases on Black Friday (November 27) totaled just under five million, BankServAfrica Bank Transaction Clearinghouse previously reported, a 30% drop compared to 2019. Online transactions, on the other hand, increased more than 60%, but could not make up for the decrease in store.
According to Linda Reid of Lightstone, data provided by Tracker indicates that traffic to shopping centers was 13% lower than last year, and only 20% higher than a “normal” Friday.
Smaller malls fared better than larger ones: They saw 10% less traffic on Black Friday compared to last week, while larger malls lost 20%.
“The more limited drop in smaller malls could possibly be attributed to pandemic crowd avoidance, but may also be indicative of a shift in Black Friday shopper behavior around bulk purchases, given economic constraints. current issues shoppers face, as these smaller malls tend to be anchored in grocery stores, ”says Colin Hundermark, corporate development executive at Tracker South Africa.
Independent retailers offering Black Friday deals, such as washing machines and televisions, fared the worst with a 25% decrease in volume compared to 2019.
On average, people spent less than half an hour in the smallest shopping malls and just over an hour in the largest.
Visits from areas where household income exceeds R40,000 per month decreased by 10% compared to Black Friday 2019, while visits from areas with household income below R10,000 decreased more than 20%.
Gateway Mall in Umhlanga recorded the highest volume of visits on Black Friday, followed by Retail Park, Atterbury Value Mart, Centurion Mall, Canal Walk, West Coast Mall, Table Bay Mall, Kingsgate Center, Menlyn Park, Mall of Africa, Clearwater and Eastgate .
Source: Lightstone / Tracker
Malls that saw a decline in normal volumes include Bloem Plaza, Ga-Rankuwa Shopping Center, Pier 14, Sammy Marks, Cedar Square, Mthatha Plaza, King Senzangakhona Shopping Center, The Boulders, Southdale Shopping Center, and Eyethu Mall.
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