The promotional campaign fever of the Black Friday, an event organized in Romania since 2011, has spread to some of the biggest actors in the country’s economy (Carrefour, Orange, Vodafone, Telekom, Digi), which are trying to take advantage of the spending appetite that might generate sales close to those in December, which usually hit record levels.
Sales could easily reach 920 million lei (EUR200 million) on Friday alone, as a survey by Kantar Millward Brown Romania revealed that 79% of the Romanians aged 18 to 65 had heard about Black Friday and 45% actually wanted to buy something.
The largest online retailer alone expects RON350 million sales on Friday.
“We expect RON350 million worth of orders on Friday. Last year we received RON300 million worth of orders. We had expected less and were surprised. We expect to sell 1.3 million products,” said Iulian Stanciu, CEO of the eMAG group, which operates the largest online store in Romania.
Altex (Media Galaxy), the largest local computer and electronics retailer, too, has been conducting promotional campaigns expected to peak on Friday.
Cel.ro, the second leading computer and electronics retailer in the country, which posted RON225 million revenue in 2016, expects sales to reach RON50 million from 200,000 products on Friday.
A lesser known online computer and electronics store, ideall.ro, which saw a higher growth rate than eMAG in 2016 and ended last year with more than RON60 million revenue, expects higher sales in 2017, almost EUR4 million.
“Black Friday sales reached EUR2.3 million in 2016. We want at least 50% growth. We believe the target can be attained, because we’ve made significant improvements in logistics, doubled the number of employees, made investments in software and in optimizing our ecommerce platform,” general manager Catalin Ciolpan said.
Elefant Online, another major retailer in Romania, which posted more than RON112 million revenue last year, expects sales to be significantly higher.
“We expect orders to exceed the 2016 Black Friday campaign by 50% in value,” CEO Dan Vidrascu said.
Even the biggest online fashion retailers expect sales to be 50% higher than in the corresponding period of last year, having added products for this shopping event. Fashion Days for instance, estimates revenue generated by the Black Friday 2017 to amount to more than RON25 million, from last year’s RON17 million.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)