It seems crazy-we’re a small business! A new business! Just breaking into the market! We should be doing everything we can to encourage people to buy buy buy, right?
Well….no, not everything. Our reasons:
At MMT, we live by the phrase Breathe Easily-we encourage everyone to pause and take a deep breath in their daily lives. Black Friday’s hyper consumerism, flash sales, limited quantities, etc don’t fit into this. Black Friday is stressful, which does not help us #BreatheEasily.
Silent is a newer product, one we want to sell and produce for years to come. Customers are a huge part of that-listening to them, getting feedback and adjusting accordingly. Interacting one on one with our buyers is a vital part of our business, and that’s impossible to do with a sudden large increase in purchases.
Over 70% of Black Friday purchases are impulse buys-leading to buyer regret and frustration. #Overconsumption is a significant problem, leading to increases in discarded products in landfills and returns. Two thirds of consumers report they impulse buy more this weekend than any other time of year-and that they typically will return many of these purchases. Even if returned, many products (ours included!) cannot be reused for safety reasons.
Honestly, it just feels like hopping on a bandwagon-something we "should" do because everyone else is doing it instead of it being the right thing to do.
We are not alone! Many brands shut down entirely for Black Friday, including: -Patagonia -Freitag -REI -Asket
Others have pledged to donate a percentage of income from the weekend to charity, plant a tree for every sale, or have even increased their prices in an #AntiBlackFriday statement (looking at you, Allbirds!)
Personally, we won’t be doing any Black Friday shopping here at MMT. Our plans involve heading to a local trail where we can hike with our pups and Breathe Easily with our Silent in place.
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