The controversy around "Black Friday" continues to swell.
One week before the promotional operation, it could finally be postponed by a week.
Read also: The players in the trade "welcome" the idea of postponing Black Friday
While a possible postponement is now clear,
Le Figaro
answers four questions to better understand the debates around Black Friday.
What is Black Friday?
The Black Friday operation, black Friday in French, is a commercial operation imported from the United States.
This is a period of exceptional promotions taking place one month before Christmas.
Across the Atlantic, Black Friday was set for the day after Thanksgiving, which falls on the fourth Thursday in November.
This year, Black Friday must begin on Friday, November 27 and end on Sunday, November 29.
It is important to note, however, that online shopping sites generally start their promotions on the Monday of Black Friday week.
Are the French followers of this promotional period?
This promotional sequence became the second sales peak of the year in France, before Christmas.
Each year, this event continues to gain notoriety in France.
According to data from the Ministry of the Economy, the French spent nearly 6 billion euros during the Black Friday weekend.
The expenses of the French reached only 482 million euros in 2013 during the period.
Initially focused on online sales sites, the event has gradually moved to shops in city centers.
In this regard, Agnès Pannier - Runacher has also indicated that "
85% of sales were made in physical stores
", against only 15% "
via platforms
" online.
RetailMeNot, the world leader in digital promotion, estimates that in-store sales in 2019 represented a total of 4.9 billion euros.
E-commerce exceeded the threshold of one billion euros in transactions.
During the last Black Friday, two out of three French people took part.
They had spent an average of 230 euros, according to data published by the GFK institute.
Fashion won the prize with 38% of purchases, followed by household appliances (21%) and IT (20%).
How is this commercial practice supervised?
From Monday, November 9, the tenant of Bercy recalled that the government did not have the possibility of prohibiting "
Black Friday
" because it is a "
private promotional operation
"
.
Unlike sales which remain regulated with two periods of four weeks in winter and in summer, "
promotions are commercial offers that do not benefit from specific supervision
"
,
specifies the official site of the French public service administration. .Fr.
According to the regulatory text, “the
merchant is free to offer them when he wants and for the products he wants.
(...) The merchant freely determines the duration of these operations.
They must nevertheless remain marginal compared to normal sales periods.
If the reduction and the promotion are valid for a specific period of time, they must be clearly indicated by the merchant
”
.
In fact, the government has its fists tied if e-merchants refuse to forgo one of their biggest annual sales periods.
In December 2019, the environmental deputy Delphine Batho wanted the state to be able to regulate "
Black Friday
".
It had tabled an amendment to this effect to the bill on the circular economy.
She considered in particular that this practice uses "
the vagueness framing promotions to obviously bypass the legislation framing the sales
".
For the deputy, Black Friday is based on a "
misleading communication
" towards consumers suggesting that they benefit from considerable price reductions, "
while a study by UFC Que Choisir shows that the average of the reductions is lower. at 2%
”, she explained last year to the National Assembly.
Finally after the debate of the deputies in the Hemicycle, the amendment had not been integrated into the law on the circular economy.
A symbolic measure had nevertheless been taken: the Assembly had amended the article concerned to link any false advertisements on Black Friday to
“misleading advertising”
, already prohibited by law.
However, the UFC-that Choose continues to campaign despite this first debacle.
This Thursday, the consumers' association reiterated its call to the government to supervise “
this kind of phony promotions
”.
Its president Alain Bazot believes that the State, by not framing the promotions with the reference price of the products, leaves "
a legal vacuum
" to be exploited for the traders,
In the French regulations in force, any seller must be able to justify the reference selling price of his product to the General Directorate for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Control (DGCCRF) in the event of an inspection.
"We must also be able to explain in fine the various promotions applied"
, explains the Federation of e-commerce and distance selling (Fevad) in
Figaro
.
In principle, the DGCCRF has the power to impose sanctions in the event of a breach of the rules.
Why is Black Friday a problem this year?
In addition to the usual debates on this commercial practice, the equation promises to be more delicate than ever for Bercy this year.
Unable to prohibit this promotional operation, Bruno Le Maire is trying to encourage online sales players to shift this Black Friday to better days, that is to say after confinement.
The tenant of Bercy wishes to avoid unfair competition between players such as Amazon and small businesses forced to remain closed.
For his part, the boss of Medef Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux considers that it is unreasonable to want to postpone Black Friday.
For him, the solution would rather be to open all businesses from November 27.
An opinion shared by several presidents of the right-wing and central departments.
The fact remains that this vast commercial operation, which is similar to 24-hour sales, could above all prove to be "
incompatible
" in this period of the Covid-19 epidemic.
The executive fears the arrival in mass of deconfined French on the shelves of stores to find the best deals, a few weeks before Christmas.
Barrier measures could be tricky to respect ...