Black Friday has come and gone. So let’s see if we have done our jobs as consumers, or have failed ourselves and fallen into the trap of major retail stores. From a behavioral economics perspective, we can examine the goals of these stores and how they nudge us to spend more money than we would typically spend. Discount prices draw us as consumers in. These major price drops encourage us to splurge and buy multiple items. This is a common trap. Buying multiple items just because they are discounted is not rational thinking. This actually makes you spend way more money than you would originally plan on spending. Additionally, retail therapy is a real thing. Buying an item because it makes you happy when you see it is a pointless purchase. It’s just a waste of money and an impulsive buy. If you would not have bought it before entering the store then do not buy it. Now that Black Friday is over you can access how well you did on your spending. Did you fall into any of these common traps or did you stay strong? It is interesting to be conscious of these traps when shopping, especially during the Holiday season.
