Black Friday in US: Bonanza or Red Ink for Chinese Vendors?

Black Friday, the biggest annual shopping event in the United States, is complicated to navigate for many Chinese cross-border e-commerce sellers. Some of them have grasped the opportunity to make money, while others are dismissing the event as unprofitable.

Black Friday, the day after the Thanksgiving holiday and once considered the unofficial start of the Christmas shopping season, is so named because it's said to be the day retailers turn to profit for the year. With the advent of online shopping, Black Friday has extended beyond just one-day sales at physical stores to weeks of discount promotions on e-commerce sites. This year's event comes amid weak consumer spending in the US.

So where does that leave Chinese cross-border vendors?

An online store on TikTok named Peicheng expects to be one of the winners. A tablet manufacturer, it is the store's first appearance in Black Friday sales after opening last March in TikTok's North American region.

Its main product, the Peicheng YQ10S Max, has now surpassed a daily sales volume of 300 units, with gross merchandise value reaching US$40,000 and total sales exceeding US$1.09 million.

"Approaching Black Friday and the year-end, my store's sales have already increased 2.5 times from usual," said a store official who asked to be identified only by his surname Li. "We estimate that sales will climb to 4 or 5 times beyond the past through mid-December.

Black Friday has been eclipsed in terms of sales in recent years by China's Singles Day shopping extravaganza in November. Many Chinese companies flushed with success there are eager to replicate profit opportunities on Black Friday.

The secret to success in a foreign market is insight into market trends and consumer profiles. As Christmas and New Year approach, most Black Friday shoppers are seeking holiday gifts, so Li said his team is promoting products with Christmasy elements.

One strategy is to promote products through short videos of influencers, set against a backdrop of Christmas trees and lights. For example, a video in which an influencer touted the YQ10S Max tablet as "the most insane, affordable Christmas gift" for her daughter received more than 50,000 likes and 13,000 saves in a single day.

Li said that Peicheng is also developing a new product named "Kids Tablet" to target youngsters 15 year and younger.

Meanwhile, sellers are also participating in major promotional events, both online and offline. One popular event was the TikTok Shop Matchmaking City Tour around the US, where influencers sought partners to promote brands on Black Friday.

GlodaStory, which provides social media sales services for overseas e-commerce platforms, said it organized a tour in New York City that drew the participation of more than 30 brands participated.

"It is crucial to build a network of influencers and then a distribution network," said Xu Yabo, founder of GlodaStory. "We found that digital products, pet products and toys from China have great potential here."

But for some vendors, Black Friday is looking more red than black.

Mala Xu, who has been running a pet products store on Amazon for four years, complained on Chinese lifestyle platform Xiaohongshu, or RedNote, that this is the "coldest" Black Friday shopping season ever.

"Previously, during major promotions, sales would generally triple to quintuple around Black Friday," she said. "In the past two years, the first and last days would generally triple, and other days would still increase by about 40 percent. However, sales in the past few days this year have been completely flat, or even worse than usual."

Other sellers expressed similar views in her comments section, calling Amazon's sales mechanism "unreasonable," causing sellers to "make great efforts all in vain."

This year, Black Friday has ushered in an extra-long sales cycle. Promotions were officially launched on Amazon on November 20, though "early bird" deals began on November 13.

"Buyers are waiting for lower prices, leading to initial orders during the promotion period failing expectations," Xu said. "Sellers are forced to maintain high discounts and intensive advertising throughout the extra-long cycle, which severely compresses profit margins."

"Besides, platform traffic is mainly skewed toward top sellers, severely squeezing the traffic pool for small and medium-sized sellers," she added. "Even with normal advertising placement, these sellers struggle to achieve sufficient exposure. Out of 380 deals during the sales, 378 were from ad promotion, and the cost is too high, and the margin is too low."

In fact, many cross-border sellers decided to skip Black Friday involvement altogether. Amazon charges a US$245 entry fee the sales that gives vendors special event badging and merchandising and has raised pressure on vendors to offer discounts of 30 percent or more.

Jia Kun, editor-in-chief of Ebrun, a cross-border e-commerce service website, said that competition between sellers heightens by the day, and differentiation is key to survival.

"Sellers need to have a clear brand positioning and product design," he said. "The Black Friday sales are not just about gross merchandise value, but a touchstone of stores and brands. Sellers need to think what they can bring to buyers that other sellers don't."