Black Friday Post - The Via Varejo experience

December is here, thus, we have just gone through Black Friday, where retailers lower product prices and, consequently, increase their sales. It is a great action for retailers to leverage sales in November, as well as for consumers who can buy products at good discounts.

Black Friday fosters the growth of several markets, especially e-commerce sites, becoming the most important date for the retail industry.

E-commerce is an example of online shopping that allows several retailers to make their products available in an online showcase, thus reaching a larger number of buyers, through a Marketplace.

Today, we are going to comment a little on Via Varejo’s experience regarding this period and the challenges that arise after this date.

Via Varejo is responsible for Casas Bahia and Pontofrio, in addition to being the administrator of the Extra e-commerce website.

So, it has great expertise and experience in online sales, in the optimization and availability of products to be attractive to consumers, as well as on Black Friday itself, a period in which the number of integrated retailers, and the demand for products and sales increase (both of their own products and those related to the marketplace).

According to what was published to the market, on Black Friday 2019 Via Varejo earned R$ 2.2 billion. And this year (2020) was no different, in fact, it was bigger!

Also, according to the recently published Money Times report, Via Varejo broke a new record and sold R$ 3 billion in the Black Friday 2020 period alone.

And according to the publication, “online sales grew 99% and accounted for 62.4% of sales for the period”.

It was already expected, both for Via Varejo itself and for us at Sensedia, as we are following the growth and use of APIs in various segments, that this year there would be a strong increase in the demand for online purchases.

Of course, the current scenario that we are still facing due to Covid-19 increases the demand for online purchases, since the entry into physical stores is controlled and restrictive. Moreover, the improvement in the availability and stability of the websites and even greater discounts and agility in the delivery of orders make this type of purchase even more attractive for consumers.

In a comparison between merchants integrated in the marketplace via API from October to November 2020, there was an increase of 51% of stores being able to make their products available for sale, thus increasing the range of products and stocks available on the e-commerce sites.

When we expand the range of analysis, comparing November 2020 with the same period of 2019, there was an increase of approximately 169% in newly registered products.

Consequently, there was also an increase in the use of these APIs in relation to non-seasonal periods, consequently, also an exponential increase in November of 158% compared to the Black Friday period last year.

All this growth is also a result of systemic stability, both in the availability of APIs and the healthy backend.

A high volume of users accessing the websites at the same time causes a system overload and even in the backend, and at this moment, it is essential to be prepared to keep them stable and operating.

Now, after the Black Friday period, the biggest demand is to update the remaining stocks that were not sold in this period, adjust prices and, especially, show the order delivery progress.

Retailers linked to the Marketplace are constantly monitored in order to ensure that delivery takes place within the time stipulated at the time of the freight quote and also that the delivery stages are constantly updated, so the customer can check the progress.

So, did you feel any difference or growth in the use of your APIs during this period? Did you manage to handle it smoothly and without problems? Tell us!

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* Written with Via Varejo