This year's Black Friday sales were closely watched, not just as an indicator of consumer sentiment, but also of the growing split between brick-and-mortar stores and online retailers such as Amazon.com. Over the last 6 years, e-commerce's share of Black Friday weekend sales have doubled to 40%.
In response, brick and mortar stores are either a) ramping up their in-store promotions, or b) growing their online channel as well. For instance, while online sales only account for 2% of total sales for Wal-mart and Target, both companies are ramping up their investment in order to catch up online. Wal-mart also introduced "Manager's Specials", which included unannounced promotions at each store manager's discretion. Best Buy also kept its doorbuster deals on Friday under wraps for most of the evening, in order to drive foot traffic to their stores. Still, stores have to contend with third party retailers like Amazon, whose sales rose 31% on Thanksgiving day and 25% on Friday.
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303332904579228512167295966
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