Kentucky experienced record-breaking sales over Thanksgiving weekend. Numbers from the Kentucky Retail Association show that Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday were all big money makers for the commonwealth.
Steve McClain is a spokesman for the association. He said there was an unexpected shift in the demographics of shoppers this year.
“One thing that was interesting was the younger shoppers tended to be out shopping in stores. The category that saw the biggest increase from last year were books and other media, video games, that kind of thing,” he said.
McClain said that the shopping period is vital for many small local retailers, who often rely on that weekend to stay afloat.
He said inflation has been a serious concern; they found that it is mostly impacting services. He said people have been cutting back in some areas, like going out to restaurants, to save money. He added that policies like the on-again-off-again tariffs have made life difficult for many business owners this year.
“When it comes to the holidays, from the consumers, we start thinking about it around October, for the retailer, they're starting to think about it in May, June, or July, so they can start thinking about what they are ordering,” he said.
Retail forecasters expect retail sales to grow between 3 and 4 percent.
