Black Friday is notorious for big deals, big names, and even bigger headlines. From the infamous Asda riots for cut-price flat screen TVs, to the now week-long marketing frenzy powered by Amazon, Black Friday, and its eCommerce sister Cyber Monday, can feel quite overwhelming for small businesses.

Black Friday started life in the US as the day after Thanksgiving. In much the same way as the January Sales have evolved after Christmas to soothe a lull after a peak sales period - and get rid of leftover stock at a cut price - Black Friday is also a post-peak sale, with people buying gifts and spending hard on food and festive consumables in the run-up to the Thanksgiving holiday. It was very uniquely a US phenomenon until the mid-2000s, when Amazon introduced the sale to UK markets as a chance to get ahead on your Christmas shopping, but it was the scenes of shoppers ransacking Asda stores in 2013 that cemented the day in UK marketing calendars. And it’s not left our email inboxes since.

For small businesses watching this juggernaut, it would be so easy to leave Black Friday to the big boys and sit the event out, but the figures can’t be ignored; in 2022 UK spending over Black Friday weekend topped out at a staggering £9.42 billion, with £5.7 billion of that online. And whilst the majority of that can be attributed to the big High Street brands such as Boots, who recorded an 18% increase against regular online sales, or retailers selling electrical goods, such as John Lewis and Amazon, there’s still something to be gained for the smaller business in this bargain-hunting maelstrom.