How to prepare for Black Friday 2018 in South Africa
Black Friday 2018 will take place on 23 November, and many South African stores are promising big sales.
Companies from Takealot to MultiChoice are preparing for the big shopping day and have told customers to keep any eye out for great specials.
To make sure you can take full advantage of all the Black Friday sales that will take place, you must prepare for the day.
With a few simple steps, you can save yourself a lot of time and money – and ensure you get all the items that are on your wish list.
The points below provide a basic overview of how to prepare for Black Friday 2018.
Make a wish list
Make a list of all the items you want to buy on Black Friday. It sounds simple enough, but a physical list will ensure you do not forget anything, or buy things that you did not initially want to.
Once you have bought an item, cross it off and move on to the next one.
Order of importance
On your list of items you want to buy, order them from most important to least important.
This will ensure that you first buy the items you want the most, before you run out of time or money – or stores sell out of their stock.
Have a budget
Set out how much you are willing to spend in total for the day, and how much you would like to spend on each item.
For example – my budget for the day is R5,000. The budget for the items I want is: R3,000 for a smartphone; R1,000 for a hard drive; and R1,000 for a Bluetooth speaker.
Once you have bought something and crossed it off your list, deduct its price from your total budget.
Have reference pricing
Once you have made a list of the items you want and set your budget, start collecting reference pricing for what you want to buy.
As an example: if you want to buy an ASUS 27-inch WQHD gaming monitor, start checking now how much it costs and if it comes up in any specials before Black Friday.
If you look around in October and early November and see that R12,000 is the best price you can find, write the reference price next to the monitor on your list.
Come Black Friday, you will not fall for the “amazing price” of R11,499. Reference pricing will help you make more informed decisions about your purchases.
List of stores
It can also be helpful to make a list of stores you want to check out. This is for two reasons.
In case you have extra funds and time, going to your favourite stores could result in you finding a good deal in a category of items you want.
More importantly, though, it will let you quickly navigate from store to store while checking the prices of items you want to buy. A quick look at various stores for the same item will give you a good overview of Black Friday prices on offer.
Check delivery times
While online stores may offer good deals on Black Friday, keep an eye out for their expected delivery times.
Online stores in South Africa have been left embarrassed in recent years after failing to fulfill large orders that come through on the day.
To combat this, many online stores now list long expected delivery times to combat shopper disappointment.
If you are buying items for a holiday, a birthday, or Christmas, make sure their promised delivery time is well before your target date.
Wake up early and check sale dates
Once you have your item, price, and store list, see when the sales start.
Certain stores will start their sales the Monday on the week of Black Friday, while others may run for several days after Black Friday. Make sure your timing is scheduled accordingly.
You will also have to wake up early for certain sales, which start just after midnight on the morning of Black Friday.
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