The Black Friday 2025 period saw significant growth in the Italian market, with many retailers benefiting from the increased demand for electronics, home appliances, and fashion items. However, e-commerce continued to lead the charge, accounting for the majority of sales, especially in the tech and fashion categories. The results from this period have set the stage for a busy holiday season, with expectations high for even more growth in December.
Holiday Shopping 2025: What to Expect for Christmas
The numbers for Black Friday 2025 tell a clear story: the market is growing, but it’s doing so in a more mature manner. The tech sector recorded solid growth compared to the previous year, with an 8.4% increase in Black Friday week, and e-commerce played an increasingly central role, exceeding 13% growth compared to 2024.
But the most interesting finding isn’t just how much was sold, but how.
Purchases weren’t concentrated exclusively on the Black Friday weekend. Instead, they were spread across the entire month of November, with a significant increase in browsing and comparison time on e-commerce sites and marketplaces.
Black Friday has thus become a process, not a sudden peak. And for brands, this has had a direct impact: those who planned their assortments, pricing, and communication in advance performed better than those who gambled everything at the last minute.
From Discount to Value: How Holiday Shopping Has Evolved
This more rational approach has also been reflected in holiday shopping. After Black Friday, many consumers didn’t stop shopping; they simply changed their mindset.
In the 2025 pre-Christmas period, purchasing decisions were driven less by the urgency of a discount and more by factors such as:
- brand reliability
- clarity on delivery times
- ease of returns
- quality of the digital experience
This behavior is consistent with a broader trend that sees consumers increasingly informed, selective, and focused on the overall value of the experience.
The Key Role of E-Commerce Between Black Friday and Christmas
During Black Friday and Christmas, online fulfilled three key functions:
- Discovery, through search engines, marketplaces, and social media
- Conversion, especially during peak promotional periods
- Offline support, with increasingly hybrid purchasing paths
This confirms that the customer journey is now omnichannel by definition, and that the integration between physical and digital is no longer optional.
What 2025 Tells Us About Shopping in 2026
Looking at how Black Friday and Christmas 2025 went, very clear signs emerge for the future as well.
In 2026, seasonal shopping will increasingly be:
- anticipated, with decisions made weeks in advance
- supported by technology, thanks to recommendation systems and AI
- less impulsive, but more driven by trust and brand consistency
According to analyses of future e-commerce trends, the adoption of artificial intelligence and automation will make the shopping experience increasingly personalized and seamless, reducing friction and decision-making times.
Black Friday and Christmas are no longer “moments”, but systems
Perhaps the most important lesson of 2025 is this: Black Friday and holiday shopping can no longer be treated as two separate events. They are part of a single commercial ecosystem, which begins well before November and continues well after the holidays.
The companies that have performed best are those that have been able to:
- read demand signals early
- plan assortments and promotions consistently
- build trust throughout the customer journey
This approach is perfectly aligned with the evolution of e-commerce towards more intelligent, data-driven, and experience-oriented models.
2026 will reward not those who push discounts alone, but those who can guide the customer at the right time, with the right message and the right offer, along an increasingly fluid and personalized journey.
And that is precisely where the next great challenge for retail will be played out.
Sources:
NielsenIQ, Netcomm, Forbes, Bernard Marr
