Wal-Mart Stores Inc. will begin offering its Cyber Week shopping deals later this week, pushing the start of its e-commerce event to a day that has traditionally been reserved for in-store bargains.
The Bentonville-based retailer's online deals will start at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Standard Time Friday as Wal-Mart tries to lure customers to its e-commerce platform earlier this holiday season.
The online sales -- which kick off at 11:01 p.m. Central Standard Time on Thursday -- begin two days ahead of last year and three days before what is known as Cyber Monday, when retailers have typically offered their best online sales.
Retail analysts believe it's natural for the digital shift to follow what has happened the past few years with Black Friday, which for years had served as the official beginning of the holiday shopping season. In recent years, retailers like Wal-Mart have opened brick-and-mortar stores early to begin holiday sales on Thanksgiving. Some deals are even taking place in the weeks before the holiday.
Carol Spieckerman, a retail analyst and president of Spieckerman Retail, said Wal-Mart's e-commerce move is another example of the "slow creep" that has been at play during the competition for customers during the critical season in retail.
"Wal-Mart's move to take its deals to digital makes sense as it competes more closely with Amazon than many of its competitors," Spieckerman said in an email. "This is a particularly relevant decision this year as Wal-Mart aggressively expands its online product assortments and on-boards more third-party sellers."
Wal-Mart previously announced its in-store Black Friday deals would begin at 6 p.m. -- in all time zones -- Thursday.
Steve Breen, Walmart.com's vice president of merchandising, said in a news release that the retailer decided to begin the online sales on Black Friday after three out of four Wal-Mart customers said they wanted to shop for cyber deals earlier. The online promotions scheduled for Friday include merchandise such as televisions, drones and other electronic devices.
In preparation for the holiday rush, Wal-Mart added 8 million items to its online site during the third quarter to beef up its offerings to 23 million. The assortment includes items from more than 3,000 third-party sellers, according to the retailer.
"By tripling our online product assortment, we're able to offer a lot more new brands and choices to customers all season long," Breen said in a statement.
Wal-Mart -- along with other retailers -- are closing in on a holiday weekend where 137.4 million people plan to shop, according to data from the National Retail Federation.
While the majority of sales will continue to take place in stores, Adobe Digital Insights predicts online sales will climb 11 percent to $91.6 billion throughout the holiday season. Cyber Monday is expected to be the largest online shopping day, generating an anticipated $3.36 billion in sales with 9.4 percent growth from last year.
Brian Yarbrough, a retail analyst for Edward Jones, said Wal-Mart's plans to start its online event earlier this year is no real surprise. Retailers are trying to find ways to "drive sales any way they can" or face the risk of losing it to a competitor whether it's online or in stores, according to Yarbrough.
"Maybe that person was going to buy on Amazon," Yarbrough said. "And maybe they buy it at Wal-Mart. So maybe there's an opportunity to get some growth there."
Yarbrough said it shouldn't matter to Wal-Mart whether it gets the sale in its store or online.
But the online push makes sense for the retailer because of its recent e-commerce efforts.
"They've been touting online. They bought Jet.com," Yarbrough said. "They're making a massive push into the online business. I think they're full steam ahead, and this is just another example."
Business on 11/22/2016