Why our prices do not move on Black Friday

Nothing here goes on sale in the last week of November. There is no banner, no sitewide percentage, no timer and no code, and the prices on the product pages are the same ones that were there in September. That is worth saying out loud rather than leaving you to discover it on the day, because the normal advice at this time of year is to wait. Waiting will not help you here, and there is one date in late November that genuinely matters, which is not the one everybody else is advertising.

Why shops discount in late November at all

Two reasons, and neither is generosity. The first is inventory: a shop that bought stock in July needs the money back before the year ends, and a unit sitting in a warehouse costs money every week it stays there. A percentage off is the fastest way to turn boxes into cash.

The second is attention. Late November is the one week where most people are actively shopping, and a shop with no offer is invisible next to a shop with a banner. The discount is bought advertising as much as it is a price.

Both are perfectly rational if you hold stock. That is the part worth understanding, because it explains why the practice is universal rather than unusual.

We have nothing to clear

Every item here is produced or collected after somebody has paid for it. There is no unsold pile, no end of season, and nothing sitting in a room costing us rent. The mechanism that drives a November sale simply is not present.

So a price here is not an opening position waiting for a date. It is what the thing costs, set once, and it stays there. A pair of cast brass bats at 18 dollars is 18 dollars in November and 18 dollars in February.

This is not restraint and we are not going to dress it up as a principle. If we had four hundred baubles in a garage in January we would behave exactly like everybody else. The absence of the garage is doing the work.

The October markup, and how to spot it anywhere

The version of discounting worth being annoyed about is the price raised shortly before it is cut. Thirty percent off a number that went up in October is not thirty percent off anything.

You can check it. Price history tools exist for the larger marketplaces, and for a smaller shop the archive of its own pages is usually visible through the Internet Archive. Look at the price in September rather than at the strikethrough in November.

The other tell is a was-price that never existed as a selling price. If a product has been on sale continuously for three months, the higher figure is a reference number rather than a price anybody paid. In the United States the Federal Trade Commission has rules about exactly this, and plenty of shops run close to the edge of them.

What is actually happening here in late November

A deadline, not a sale. Our objects stop being sold on 24 November, which falls before the Black Friday weekend. Printed goods stop on 15 December. Those are the last dates either route can be relied on to arrive for Christmas, and we stop selling rather than take money for something that will miss.

Objects come from our supplier overseas and are quoted at 10 to 18 business days, which is three to four weeks on a calendar. Printed goods are made to order in the United States and take 2 to 5 business days to produce plus transit. The cutoffs are those windows counted backwards from Christmas, with a margin.

So by the weekend everybody else is selling hardest, a seasonal item like a set of six black and gold baubles has already closed for the year and the page says so. Nothing about that is a tactic. It is an honest consequence of a slow route, and the only way we know to handle it is to stop.

No countdown, and no number of units left

There is no timer on any page here, no count of how many are left and no line telling you that other people are looking at the same thing. Two reasons.

The first is that we would have to invent the numbers. We do not hold the stock, so we do not know how many units exist at the supplier, and any figure we printed would be a guess dressed as data.

The second is that scarcity messaging is a way of shortening the time you spend thinking, and the whole argument for buying a solid object rather than a cheap one depends on you taking that time. A shop that wants you to decide in nine seconds does not want you comparing materials.

If you want the lowest price we offer

Buy a set where the components genuinely cost less to fulfil together. The eight dry creatures are 112 dollars against 128 bought one at a time, and the comparison figure is printed on the page beside the price so you can check it. That saving is a real difference in what it costs to move fourteen small heavy things.

Then put your whole list in one order. Shipping is a flat 9.95 dollars per order and free over 85, charged once even when an order arrives as more than one parcel. For most baskets that is a bigger number than any code you will find elsewhere.

And if you are a member, five percent of every order goes back as store credit which does not expire. That is the closest thing to a discount we run, and it arrives after the fact rather than as a reason to hurry.

Questions people actually ask

Do you have a Black Friday sale?

No. Prices do not change for the date, there is no sitewide percentage and no code. We hold no stock, so there is nothing to clear and no reason for a November markdown.

Is it worth waiting until Black Friday to buy here?

No, and waiting can cost you. Our objects stop being sold on 24 November, which falls before the Black Friday weekend, because that is the last date the overseas route can be relied on for Christmas.

How can I tell if a Black Friday discount is real?

Check what the price was in September rather than the strikethrough in November. Price history tools cover the large marketplaces, and a smaller shop's older pages are often visible in the Internet Archive.

Why are there no countdown timers or stock counts on your pages?

Because we would have to invent the numbers. We do not hold the stock and do not know how many units exist at the supplier, so any figure shown would be a guess presented as a fact.