How to shop smart and avoid Black Friday ripoffs

Friday, 28 November 2025

Black Friday sales can be a good way of saving some money - but only if you find genuine deals, and make use of discounts for items you actually need.

Black Friday sales are here, with retailers slashing prices to clear stock. But experts warn to double check deals to make sure the discounts are real.

Massey University marketing lecturer Bodo Lang said Black Friday sales had become “a vicious cycle”, particularly for retailers who needed to make sales, but may not necessarily be able to afford to discount heavily.

“In an ideal world, they wouldn't do it at all, but they're doing it because they know it is highly attractive to shoppers, and it will result in more clicks on the website and people through the store, and they will undoubtedly make more sales,” Lang said.

But it may not necessarily be cheaper.

Consumer tracked the prices of 10 products at four major retailers over the past 14 weeks.

For half of the products, shoppers could have found the same or lower prices at some point in the last 3 months compared with today.

Four of the products tracked at Briscoes were cheaper at some stage during the last 14 weeks than they are today, this included the Kenwood Chef Mixer priced at $490.00 today, but it was cheaper on November 20, at $449.99m and a Breville four-slice toaster was found to be priced at $125.99 today, but available for $105.00 in September.

At Noel Leeming, four products offered a genuine Black Friday deal, and three products were found to be more expensive previously, and Consumer found four products it tracked at Farmers more expensive in the Black Friday sales.

Consumer New Zealand tracked prices for 12 weeks and found that while retailers claim frequent deals, the actual prices often did not shift significantly.

A Russell Hobbs air fryer was priced at $159 for Black Friday but could have been purchased for $147 in early November. A Breville Toastset Toaster was $109 in September, $158 in October, and $209.99 today, at Noel Leeming.

A Nutribullet is $99.99 today at Farmers, but it was listed as a special offer of $69.99 in September and $74.99 in October.

At Harvey Norman, some products tracked at Harvey Norman offered significant savings over the past 2 weeks. However, some products were found to be just a dollar or two cheaper than they had been, and the Russell Hobbs Satisfry was $51 more expensive today than it had been in September.

Lang said this highlighted the “sales promotion trap” and the importance of doing your research before you buy. He encouraged shoppers to use websites that compare prices like PriceSpy and PriceMe for the product pricing history.

Where it became blurred is the label promotional price, how that was worked out and what was the original price it was compared to.

Massey University’s Bodo Lang says there are genuine deals out there, but you have to do your own research and dig a bit deeper to find them.

“If the original price was actually inflated, then the sale price could be considered to be more like a normal price.”

Warehouse Group chief executive Mark Stirton says New Zealand retail has trained the consumer to “hunt for discounts all the time”, making it more difficult for retailers like The Warehouse.

Discouts of 20% or greater is most effective, says Lang. “That's when people start paying attention and coming in store.”

And in many cases consumers won’t buy unless an item is labelled as on special or having a discount.

“New Zealand shoppers have been conditioned to respond to sales promotion for many decades, but it's been increasing and increasing, and that makes it really difficult to charge normal full price for retailers in those in between periods,” he said.

“If you are a general retailer, your sales will really go quite flat during the non sales period, but then they will get extremely busy during sales events, and that's not great for anybody; not for staff, not for stocking, and not consumers.”

Consumer head of research and advocacy at Consumer NZ, Gemma Rasmussen, said retailers knew how to tap into the excitement of Black Friday sales and were masters of marketing.

She said Black Friday this year felt “a bit underwhelming” this year, based on its analysis of 10 products across four stores.

Rasmussen said she was disappointed, but not surprised, by the findings.

“Don’t be swayed by phrases like ‘hot deal’, ‘massive stock sell-out’ and ‘great price’.”.

Black Friday is typically seen as the event that typically kicks of a surge in retail spending ahead of Christmas.

Across all the products Consumer tracked, there is only one item cheaper today than yesterday that seems to be a genuinely good bargain – a Dyson stick vacuum on sale at Harvey Norman and Farmers today for $599, she said.

Over the past 3 months, that product has been priced at $1199 for every week at Farmers and for nine out of fourteen weeks at Harvey Norman.

Lang said there were genuine deals out there, but you did have to do your own research and dig a bit deeper to find them.

“Be sure to know which product you actually need, so don't just buy something because it's on sale, but then don't just buy a model because it's on sale, buy the model that suits you best within the budget you have.

That half an hour of work can save you hundreds, possibly thousands of dollars, he said.

“Be a smart shopper and think about what you actually need. So many people spend money on things they don't need, and research has shown that buying stuff doesn't make you happy.”