This could be the craziest Golden Quarter yet

The months leading up to the Christmas period are the busiest in the retail calendar – hence the nickname ‘the Golden Quarter’. As more and more companies have tried to cash in on this phenomena, the bigger it has grown.

Each year, the Golden Quarter promises to generate ever greater revenues, and 2021 is no different. But unlike previous years, several once-in-a-generation factors have emerged which threaten to make these months some of the craziest in recent retail history.

Here’s everything you need to know to get your ecommerce operation ready for this coming opportunity.

When is the Golden Quarter?

The Golden Quarter are the months which typically have the highest volumes of sales, hand-in-hand with the most prominent promotional offers.

The key dates are:

• Black Friday: November 26th
• Cyber Monday: November 29th
• Christmas Day: December 25th
• Boxing Day: December 26th
• January sales

Other important dates include Halloween (October 31), which attracts more and more spend each year, Singles Day (November 11) which accounts for billions of pounds of revenue in just one day but is largely confined to China, and Amazon Prime Day.

Amazon already hosted its annual Prime Day in June, but many tech experts believe a second, probably in October, could happen.

The good news

By all accounts, this year’s Golden Quarter will generate more revenue than any year before it. This is the result of a number of factors, but largely because many people now feel free of the Covid-19 pandemic. They’re looking forward to spending time with friends and family, their employment worries may be behind them, and the mood in the UK is generally good.

In fact, so excited are we for a more normal Christmas than last year (which occurred during an on-again-off-again lockdown) that an eBay study has found that more than a quarter of shoppers have already started planning their festive shopping. And nearly a third of those surveyed planned to spend more this year than last year.

And it’s not just Christmas that drives up sales. Black Friday and Cyber Monday have grown to become significant days in the UK retail calendar. And while the latter (and, to a large degree, the former) are centred around online sales rather than high street shopping, these will each benefit from the vast number of people who discovered ecommerce during the pandemic.

All in all, we’ve got more online shoppers, more reasons to be cheerful, and more cash to spend. This could be your time to shine!

What you need to do: Customers are already browsing, bookmarking links and seeking out discount codes, ready to spend. This means if you haven’t already got your marketing underway, it’s about time to start. It’s time to build your brand now, and plan the offers and discounts you intend to offer and when.

The bad news

On the surface, retail may seem to be optimistic about the coming months but, dig a little deeper, and there’s a lot of uncertainty, particularly surrounding supply chains.

There have been two major events which have seriously complicated matters. The Covid-19 pandemic caused many raw materials suppliers and manufacturers to interrupt, slow down or even cancel operations for several months. Where more than one supplier in a chain is affected, this has caused serious backlogs and major disruptions.

This has been coupled with Brexit, which has caused a shortage of labour, crucially affecting both manufacture and delivery of goods (both to shops and to our front doors). For those that import materials or export to European customers, there is added paperwork and costs which have made things much more complicated and expensive.

Photographs of empty supermarket shelves have made the news and as the Golden Quarter picks up pace, there may be many more retailers across a wider array of industries which are negatively affected.

What you need to do: Take a deep and honest look at your supply chain and delivery network. Winning orders may only be half the challenge in 2021, fulfilling them is every bit as important and perhaps even more challenging.

The Golden Quarter is a great opportunity to build your brand, using deals and offers to attract new customers. But failing to fulfill your promises could turn customers away forever, and they’ll leave bad reviews all over the internet letting everybody know why.

The future

Whether the Golden Quarter of 2021 proves to be an entirely successful, problem-free sales hit, a muddle of broken supply chains, late deliveries and unhappy customers, or somewhere in between, there’s a lot we will learn by observing what unfolds.

Firstly, there are several trials underway into rapid delivery options. Next-day delivery used to be a major feather in the cap of a retailer. Today, Sainsbury’s currently offers delivery within 20 minutes from a small selection of its supermarkets, and Screwfix is trialing 30 minute deliveries of its DIY goods. Can these systems work, and will this become what customers demand as standard?

Secondly, we’ll learn just how much of a shift there has been towards online shopping at the expense of high street shopping. Christmas shopping, for example, can be as much an experience as a chore. But if shoppers would rather browse online from home and in their pyjamas than head out to experience music, displays, hot drinks and the social element of shopping with friends, then we can conclude that ecommerce is now the formidable force the pandemic showed it could become.

What you need to do: Watch your sector with a curious eye to see what customers are demanding and how retailers are responding. Look outside of your sector, too, to see if there are any innovations which you can adopt. Ecommerce has always evolved quickly and it’s important to keep your finger on the pulse, or risk being left behind.