We sometimes think we’re getting a good deal, when the reality is quite different… So before buying during Black Friday, look at what a reduction displayed at -70% really hides.
Every year, it’s THE shopping event for bargain hunters. Less than a month before Christmas, Black Friday is the ideal opportunity to prepare gifts for everyone around you… without breaking the bank. Initially launched in the United States to revive the economy after the stock market crash of October 1929, this true “feast of good deals” has found its followers in France since the beginning of the 2010s. Now, there are few brands or brands that do not offer shock reductions in the run-up to this Black Friday, to the point of having even created a “Black Week” and a “Black Month”, with promotions that sometimes last an entire month.
In any case, this date which follows the Thanksgiving holiday – it will be Friday November 28 this year – is without context the day on which it is appropriate to take out your credit card. It must be said that with prices sometimes reaching -70% or more, it is difficult to resist the temptation. However, we think we are getting a good deal… but the reality is often quite different. In 2024, UFC-Que Choisir unveiled a damning study: by comparing the price difference of 65,000 items between Black Friday and the rest of the month of November, the consumer association discovered that the reductions were far from being as significant as announced.
Whether it concerns high-tech products or even household appliances, the average difference with the prices charged before Black Friday never exceeds -4%. Thus, the actual discounts on smartphones were just -1.6% compared to November. The same goes for computers, whose price only fell by -1.9% on average. The worst performers are household appliances, such as dishwashers or microwaves for example, with an average reduction of barely -0.5%. The differences are more marked for televisions, but they remain only -3.7% compared to the prices charged for the entire month. We are still a long way from the promotions displayed by brands, which can sometimes go up to -80%.
Worse still, according to UFC-Que Choisir, certain prices announced during promotions did not drop a single cent, or even increased during Black Friday! This is the case, for example, of a washing machine sold by Boulanger last year: supposed to go from 799 euros to 599 euros, or a 25% reduction, it actually remained at the same price as before. On Cdiscount, an Airfryer cost even more than in the days preceding Black Friday: sold at 69.99 euros instead of 119.99 euros, a supposed discount of 41%, it was in reality priced at 59.99 euros before this promotional Friday. The fault is the “reference price”, this crossed out amount that we see next to the new price on sale. The law requires that it correspond to the price charged during the last 30 days before the reduction, but in reality, this is far from always being the case. It is possible to circumvent the regulations by displaying a competitor’s price or even an old price for example, which can therefore mislead the consumer.
Luckily, there are solutions for tracking price changes on certain merchant sites, like Amazon. Applications called “Price Tracker” can be installed on a computer or phone, allowing you to see the history of changes in the price of each product. Enough to try to protect yourself against scams before the arrival of Black Friday 2025. Because there is no doubt that this year will not be very different and that certain attractive offers will in reality only be an illusion.
