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Black Friday Turns Grety as Brick & Mortar Falls to Online Shopping
More online sales were logged on Black Friday than at brick and mortar retailers according to preliminary data, though the day was still the busiest shopping day of the year. Store traffic on Thanksgiving evening itself though grew, which itself hurts Black Friday sales but probably not total sales for the weekend. Online sales grew about 20% for a total of $7.4 billion, just below the $7.6 billion estimate. Thanksgiving sales grew 14.5% to $4.2 billion. Thanksgiving traffic was up 2.3%, and Black Friday traffic was down 6.2% for a year ago. Statistics could be misleading though, since the practice of buying online and picking up at the store is not considered store traffic, but rather an online sale.
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One retailer that had a particularly bad day though was Costco (NASDAQ:COST), due to a traffic overload on its website that affected 2.65 million users for about 16 hours. Costco believes that could have lost about 11 million in sales due to the glitch. Nordstrom (NYSE:JWN) and Home Depot (NYSE:HD) also encountered website problems though not as serious as Costco’s.
Burger King’s Impossible Whopper Gets Sued By Vegan
Burger King, subsidiary of Restaurant Brands International (NYSE:QSR), is having an impossible problem with one of its burgers. The Impossible Whopper, touted as 100% whopper 0% beef, is under fire after a vegan who ordered and ate one found out that it is cooked on the same broiler as other beef burgers, and is therefore coated in beef juice. The patron is now suing the restaurant for false advertising. One Bloomberg opinionater believes that the ruling could have serious implications for Burger King, as the Impossible offering has helped fuel sales growth, but even if Burger King loses the suit and the Impossible Whopper is declared meat if cooked on a meat broiler, Burger King can always cook the burgers separately and call it a day. The author cites an interesting case from back in 2003 where a woman lost a suit in which she claimed a medical company assured her that a tuberculosis vaccine was vegan-friendly when it contained animal products. She lost the suit because her claims were considered idiosyncratic, but now that veganism is more popular that reasoning may no longer hold. We may now start to see a more regulated and streamlined code as to what constitutes “vegan-friendly”.
Apollo Outbids Berkshire For Tech Data
Apollo Global Management (NYSE:APO) has reportedly outbid Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK-B) for the software firm Tech Data (NASDAQ:TECD). Apollo had offered $130 a share, Berkshire countered with $140, and finally Apollo came back with $145 and won. Buffett’s company now has $128 billion in cash burning a big hole in its pocket after Buffett wrote that he is hoping for “an elephant-sized acquisition”. Berkshire owns shares in Southwest, Delta, American and United Airlines, and there are rumors he may want to buy beleaguered California utility PG&E (NYSE:PCG).