TMCo Annual Black Friday Anti-Sale 2021
Instead of a traditional Black Friday sale, Tailgate has an annual anti-sale. Rather than dropping prices, we will be donating 10% of all sales from November 26-29, 2021 (online and in-store) to Kidsport Okotoks.
Supporting Kidsport Okotoks means we will be helping kids right here in OUR community, the town of Okotoks. And given the current circumstances, there may be more help needed than ever when kids finally return to sport. I believe finances should never be a barrier to keep kids from participating in sport.
So if you're mad we're having an anti-sale and not a sale-sale, I'm not sorry. We have other awesome sales throughout the year, score your bargain then. I'd rather use local dollars to support local kids playing local sports. I'm pretty set in my convictions regarding Black Friday. I'm also pretty passionate about NOT supporting Amazon and other large scale (mostly American) businesses that don't pay local, provincial, federal taxes or hire local people.
Here's the deal, I get that some people need to take advantage of extreme savings on "Black Friday" but as a small business owner, I just can't justify offering rock bottom prices simply to encourage mass consumption...especially these days as we are still struggling through the pandemic.
First of all, Black Friday and its accompanying "Small Business Saturday" and "Cyber Monday" days are derived from American Thanksgiving. And as much as I love my neighbours to the south, this is not a holiday in Canada. Period.
Small Business Saturday is the local mom and pop shops way of fighting against the enormous corporations who drop their prices on Black Friday. Even though it's great to promote shopping small on the Saturday, there's no competition when dealing with the psychology of Black Friday. Black Friday creates FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). What if you don't go out and score a bargain? Will you miss out on a great deal? You'll never save $100 on a big TV (that you didn't even need) ever again!!!
With this mindset, how can a small business ever compete?
And let's be honest - the leader behind "Cyber Monday" is no doubt Amazon. Since they lack a physical storefront, they miss out on the Black Friday frenzy and need to capture those dollars somehow. Instead of battling crowds on Friday, simply stay home in your pjs and shop online on Monday, brilliant! Too bad they don't pay local taxes or support local initiatives with their billions of dollars....oh wait, that's because they're not a local business.
I'd be a hypocrite to say don't shop Black Friday sales since I too have purposely made purchases that day to save a few bucks. And I certainly don't hold it against other businesses who have Black Friday sales. Big sales in November and December are important in the retail industry to help financially during the quiet months of January and February. All I ask is that you stop and think about how this "holiday" came about and what it really means as a Canadian. And are you spending your money on quality or just junk that happens to be discounted? Think quality over quantity these days!
So rather than having a traditional sale, I'm choose to give back each holiday season to a local organization helping local kids..and I hope you do too.