In Switzerland, Black Friday is already the biggest shopping event of the year. It always takes place on the Friday following Thanksgiving in the USA and this year it fell on 26 November. E-commerce trade also benefits from the highest-revenue day of the year.

The Swiss payment service provider, Payrexx, specialises in processing digital payments for small and medium e-commerce Comerciantes and has conducted a data collection of online transactions from Black Friday 2021 and the previous Friday. Furthermore, the developments of transactions on Black Friday were analysed in comparison to the previous year.

Online revenues double

Compared to the previous week's Friday, online revenues processed via the Payrexx payment platform more than doubled on Black Friday. The peak revenue times were in the morning. Between 10 a.m. and 12 noon, consumers were particularly eager to buy, as shown by the following graphs.

Time analysis of transaction volume on 19.11.2021 and 26.11.2021

Online purchases increased by 85 per cent

The number of transactions increased by around 85% and the 10% increase in the average shopping cart size also shows that consumers are willing to spend more on Black Friday.

Time analysis of the number of transactions on 19.11.2021 and 26.11.2021

Returns compared to last year

Compared to Black Friday 2020, the evaluation of the average transaction volume per Comerciante showed a decrease of 25%. While the volume last year was still CHF 1,346 per Comerciante, this year it was only EUR 1,014.

An explanation for this is provided by the data from Adobe Analytics. According to the data, consumers returned to shops more frequently this year, leading to a decline in online trade.

Data collection

The data show an evaluation of the transactions processed through the Payrexx platform. The analysis is based on a sample of 550 small e-commerce enterprises with a maximum transaction volume of 1 million EUR per year. The measurement includes data from 19.11.2021, 26.11.2021, and 27.11.2020 between 00:00 and 23:59.

This is Payrexx

Payrexx was founded in Thun in 2015 and has specialised as a payment institution in processing digital payment methods. The Swiss company operates a self-developed payment platform as a registered Payment Facilitator of Mastercard and VISA. More than 40,000 customers across Europe process their payments via the cloud-based platform. The range extends from regionally strong companies like BKW, Swiss Youth Hostels, and Swissmilk to large corporations like SBB, Swiss Post, Swisscom, and SIXT.

The platform integrates more than 40 payment providers and over 200 payment methods and currencies from all over the world via a single interface. These include popular payment types such as Mastercard and VISA, as well as TWINT, PostFinance, and PayPal.

All systems of Payrexx are designed redundantly, guarantee maximum reliability, and are certified according to the strictest PCI-DSS Level-1 guidelines.