Black Friday Tradition Spreads Across Latin America

By Taylor Pineda

“The Good Weekend” (“El Buen Fin”), Latin America’s very own Black Friday continues to grow despite no Turkey tradition. Trends from the U.S holiday such as Cyber Monday have also begun to trickle down to countries like, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Panama, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Peru and Brazil. All countries vary in the style of sales, dates of sales, to the naming of the shopping period. “EL Buen Fin”, is explicitly used in Mexico.

“Mexico City saw a 12 percent increase in Black Friday sales, and Pedro Eugenio, the founder of the Brazilian discount website Busca Desconto that helps organize online sales in that country, is predicting $146 million in online revenues, a 60 percent increase compared to 2012,” as reported by Fox News Latino.

The Nov. 15th-18th, “El Buen Fin” shopping experience produces similar attributes to the hectic Black Friday experienced in the states. “This year the weekend generated $12 billion in sales for eighty thousand outlets in Mexico City,” as reported by Fox News Latino.

One of the world’s fastest growing consumer countries, Brazil, starts the sales the night of the American holiday. The primary mean of sales come from the internet, however superstores like Walmart and its Brazilian equivalent, draw crowds of thousands.

“People yelling and grabbing,” is how Elaine Ferreira, an employee at an Extra in Rio, described the scene. “People line up and burst into the store. If there’s a good deal on some electronics like TVs.”

“Last year, I went to the stores but I bought 90 percent online,” said Diego Duarte de Sousa, a 26-year-old financial analyst from Rio told Fox News Latino. “You don’t have to confront the chaos in the stores.”

Mexican stores typically mark goods down for less than what we see in the U.S., however, Brazil, because of high tariffs on foreign goods, do not offer as grand of deals.

Similar to scams that have happened over the shopping day in the states, Mexico and Brazil have been caught raising prices in the weeks before sales events in order to offer them at the “discounted” original price. Scams have come to be known as “Black Fraud” in Brazil.

“We’re still behind the United States’ Black Friday in quality of products and the organization of the stores,” said Rio’s Duarte de Sousa to Fox News Latino. “But I think this a start.”