Household staples, Christmas gifts, and pricey big-ticket items are some good lists to compile, marketing expert Jess Ruhfus suggested.
Bonus tip: Create an email filter for Black Friday so you can set aside time to look through all the deals properly – and unsubscribe from those you don’t want to hear from any more.
Price tracking and plugins: Beef up the toolkit
This one is for hardcore shoppers willing to make the extra effort to save big: there are some websites, price-tracking tools and browser plugins that can help you find the very best deal and save extra dollars.
Financial adviser James Gerrard uses a spreadsheet to track the products he wants across various retailers, so he can choose from a few options when the sale goes live.
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He pointed to OzBargain and a Black Friday Cheat Sheet, updated daily, by financial media outfit Two Broke Chicks as some handy websites.
Others include Zyft, a browser extension or app that reveals if a product can be found cheaper somewhere else; BuyWisely, another browser extension that shows you a historical chart of the item’s previous prices; and CamelCamelCamel, particularly useful for Amazon shoppers to track prices from Amazon as well as third-party sellers.
Gerrard also recommends looking into cashback plugins; he uses TopCashback and ShopBack.
“During the Black Friday sales, sometimes the cashback rewards are heightened,” said Gerrard. “It doesn’t cost anything – every year I get $1000, $2000 back from these cashback rewards.”
Timing matters – but it depends what you’re buying
So when, exactly, is the best time to shop during Black Friday, since it’s become a month-long event?
This masthead received some conflicting advice on this one. Ecommerce expert Kelly Slessor told us not to wait. “In previous years, ‘low stock’ was often just a tactic to trigger urgency—but this year, it’s real. Tariffs and tighter supply chains mean inventory is genuinely limited.”
Some businesses are providing early access to keen shoppers, which saw luggage brand July’s new range sell out in certain colours by mid-November.
Meanwhile, Makkar suggested shopping when a retailer least expects you to; that is, avoid the high-traffic window just after a sale goes live, and right before it ends.
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“The quiet middle period often has the steepest real discounts because retailers monitor slow hours/footfall and auto-adjust pricing to stimulate volume,” she said.
This is where those price-tracking tools come in. “If a product typically bottoms out in week three of promotions, odds are it will do so again because retailers optimise stick to those predictable peaks.”
The answer is: it depends what you’re buying. If it’s a limited edition or specialised item, it’s well worth checking out your cart sooner rather than later.
“If it’s a particular style of fashion item, [like] a very specific gown from Aje or something, that’s a consideration,” said Jess Ruhfus.
But there’s less urgency around everyday household staples, as retailers will have prepared for the high demand, she added.
The biggest discounts may be during Black Friday itself
Retail consultant Trent Rigby believes the best advice is to be patient and wait until the actual Black Friday weekend (November 28) itself.
“Retailers push hard for customers to spend early because there’s less competition for your wallet before the actual Black Friday-Cyber Monday weekend,” he said.
The worst-case scenario is the deal stays exactly the same; the best-case scenario is that the biggest discounts are unlocked on the day.
“I saw a few cases of shoppers getting burnt buying in early November thinking they’d scored a deal, only to watch the price drop further,” Rigby said. “Chances are, if they’re running an early sale, they’re going to run another one or extend it.”
There’s always Boxing Day
Although Black Friday has overtaken Boxing Day as the end-of-year sales marathon, it’s still “very much a thing here”, said Rigby.
One thing to note is that Black Friday tends to be supplier-funded – that is, the big brands fund the discounts – while Boxing Day is typically retailer-funded to clear excess Christmas stock.
The retail consultant’s rule of thumb is to buy tech, beauty, sport, sneakers and more premium brands during Black Friday, while fashion, home, furniture, gifts and toys are more likely to go on sale again on Boxing Day.
“Don’t worry too much if you miss out, as they almost always go back on sale at similar price points in late December,” he said.
“But in saying that, if you wait for Boxing Day, the price difference is usually minimal, so you’re often better off just buying [on Black Friday] and enjoying it sooner.”
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