Students study behavior of Black Friday shoppers
Brittni Garcia/Campus Editor
Issue date: 12/1/08 Section: News
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A New York Wal-Mart worker died in a stampede and two people were killed after shots were fired in a Toys 'R Us in California.
With the craziness that comes with the day after Thanksgiving, the family and consumer sciences department has created a study.
Researchers include professor Linda Simpson, professor Kathleen O'Rourke, professor Lisa Taylor, doctoral student Katie Shaw, doctoral student Jill Bowers and professor Deborah Reifsteck.
The study was conducted on Black Friday in November 2006 and 2007 and is designed to research the behaviors of consumers during Black Friday. The research collected helped continue study on this year's Black Friday.
Graduate and undergraduate students comprised the 23 observers during the study. Overall, they recorded 217 observations in 2006 and 2007.
According to a press release, this study provides a unique contribution to retailers to show observations of shopping behavior on Black Friday. It also states most conclusions have been drawn from the media, with cameras capturing the chaos when the stores open.
Simpson said this allows the research team to work on a research project in an interdisciplinary manner since they all come from three different parts of the department - family services, consumer studies and merchandising.
"It also allows us as professors to work with students and gives application to everyday life, which is something they might not get in the classroom," Simpson said.
To begin their research, undergraduate and graduate students received five hours of observation training. They then went out on Black Friday to observe the consumer behavior by using specific questions the team created.
The observers did not have specific stores to go to, but did observe local stores near their hometowns because they were home for break.
Simpson developed the idea of the study after conducting a discussion with her class about Black Friday.
"The discussion sparked an interest for her, and she developed a research team that brings their own specialty to the study," Taylor said.
Observers indicated the majority of the customers were Caucasian females. Females accounted for 68 percent of the customers while males only accounted for 32 percent. Because of the nature of the study, customers are not interviewed so the research team could not determine what age group is most common.
This study stated most stores opened at 6 a.m., and the chaos lasted from three to 150 minutes.
Simpson said the time span happens because that is when consumers are scrambling to get to products they have been waiting in line to purchase.
"They want to make sure that they are able to get their hands on the product of their desire," Simpson said. "Some stores are better at handling the chaos than others."
To limit chaos, Taylor said retailers should develop a plan to organize consumers.
"For example, handing out vouchers to guarantee access to the product(s) they are waiting for, providing security at the door to ensure that consumers enter in a safe manner and giving consumers a map of the store so they know where products are located," Taylor said.
Developing the research questions, reviewing the current literature on the subject and developing research/data collection methods were some important aspects the research team had to administer.
Taylor said having a team of researchers that work well together was a big part of this research.
"Each team member brings a unique area of expertise to the project," Taylor said.
This is the third year the study has been conducted. Each year the training, observation instrument and methods have been evaluated, and changes have been made. The entire process has been a group effort.
The research team believes the results are limited to the number of observations and the conclusions may not represent all Black Friday customers and retail store locations.
They also believe this study helps notify the public of the behaviors, motivations and intentions of the Black Friday retail customers.
What they noticed
Shopper Demographics
• The majority (68%) of the customers were female while 32% of customers were male
• The majority of customers were Caucasian (72.67%), 15.90% were African-American, 8.12% were Hispanic, 3.91% were Asian, and 8.71% were other
• Approximately 9.48% of the customers appeared to be under 18, 34% appeared to be between the ages of 19-30, 48.41% appeared 31-60 years old, and 8.5% appeared over 61
Line Observation
• One-third of the customers waited in line for one hour, 28.6% waited for 30 minutes; the longest a customer waited in line was ten hours (overnight)
• The number of customers waiting in line for store opening ranged from 50-600; the average was 217
How customers behaved in line
• The majority of the customers were socializing (82.6%) and excited (60.9%), but also anxious (73.9%) and tired (60.9%)
• Seventy-five percent of the observers noted that "some" of the customers were alone but that the majority were with companions; 62.5% of the observers indicated that "most" of the customers appeared to be with family members, and 50% of the observers noted that "most" of the shoppers appeared to be with friends
Store Opening
• Store opening results were as follows: 53.4% of the stores opened at 6 a.m., 28.9% at 5 a.m., 12.9% at 4 a.m., 4.3% at midnight, and 0.4% at 9 a.m.
• More than half of the observers (56.5%) indicated that "most" of the customers they observed walked hurriedly when the store opened, about half reported that "some" of the customers yelled upon store opening, and 65.2% of the observers reported that "most" or "all" of the customers grabbed products when the store doors opened
• No customers were injured when the stores opened
• The chaos in the store after the doors opened lasted anywhere from 3 minutes to 150 minutes with an average of 35 minutes
Individual Observations
• With regard to the products that the individual customers were buying, the observers indicated that 64% of the individual customers seemed to have a specific product in mind when they shopped, 81.7% appeared to purchase products that were on sale, 65.2% appeared to purchase gifts for others, and 30.9% appeared to buy products for themselves
• 63.2% of the customers compared product labels
• At some point during the observations, customers exhibited calmness (42.9%), anxiety (41.2%), irritability (34.1%), belligerence (9.7%), boredom (8.8%), and sadness (2.7%)
• 58.1% communicated with their shopping companion while shopping
• 24.9% grabbed as many items as they could while shopping
• In addition, customers displayed irritable aggression (aggression directed toward an available target induced by some sort of frustration) (31.9%), grabbing of products (26.5%), and general aggression (22.6%)
• No choking, kicking, punching or weapon usage was witnessed
Brittni Garcia can be reached at 581-7942 or at bmgarcia@eiu.edu.
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